


The Deep Woods

by rincewitch



Series: Warrior of Moonlight [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Idiots in Love, Past Haurchefant Greystone/Warrior of Light, Slow Burn, Smut, allusions to past abuse, that 'major character death' tag is just for deaths that happen in the msq
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:48:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 44,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25317829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rincewitch/pseuds/rincewitch
Summary: “If I may,” Thancred said, shaking the conjurer from her reverie, “The lovely maiden beside me is named Y’shtola.” He glanced back at his friend, grinning wolfishly. “Limsa Lominsa has the pleasure of being under her care.”Y’shtola pointedly ignored Thancred, instead looking the newest Scion directly in the eye. “Greetings,” she deadpanned.“...hi,” said the adventurer. Her face was darkened by a slight blush-- embarrassment at Thancred’s antics, no doubt.
Relationships: Lyse Hext/Y'shtola Rhul/Warrior of Light, Y'shtola Rhul & Thancred Waters, Y'shtola Rhul/Warrior of Light
Series: Warrior of Moonlight [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1905535
Comments: 44
Kudos: 171





	1. seventh umbral

**Y’shtola**

Y’shtola first saw her in the Waking Sands’ solar— the latest prospective Scion of the Seventh Dawn, singled out from the larger body of adventurers by Hydaelyn’s light. A gladiator, Thancred had told her, who’d decided to use her winnings to make a go of it as an independent adventurer. _And she’s beautiful,_ Thancred added, because he was Thancred and therefore constitutionally unable to describe a woman in any other terms.

Y’shtola wasn’t sure what to expect, but it definitely wasn’t the slip of a thing that Thancred ushered into the solar. Y’shtola never thought of herself as particularly tall, but the miqo’te adventurer was still several ilms shorter than her. She was petite but wiry, hungry-looking, her golden eyes warily sweeping the room even as Minfilia gave her customary speech about the nature of the Echo and the history of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn. Her armor was brand-new and polished to a sheen, but the surcoat beneath it looked a bit threadbare. She was _young,_ too, with spatter of freckles over her aquiline nose, but every bit of exposed skin-- her hands, the thin gap between her gauntlet and the chainmail protecting her upper-arm, those taut, freckled cheeks-- was crisscrossed by scars.

Frankly, Y’shtola felt like she looked ready to bolt at any second. She’d carefully positioned herself behind the gathered Scions, not exposing her back to anyway, nothing between her and the exit. Her hand lingered near the hilt of the gladius at her hip-- not so close as to be provocative, of course, but still conveying a sense of readiness. She remained still as she listened to the Antecedant’s proposal, but she was a coiled spring, all tightly-wound kinetic energy and potential.

“If I may,” Thancred said, shaking the conjurer from her reverie, “The lovely maiden beside me is named Y’shtola.” He glanced back at his friend, grinning wolfishly. “Limsa Lominsa has the _pleasure_ of being under her care.”

Y’shtola pointed ignored Thancred, instead looking the newest Scion directly in the eye. “Greetings,” she deadpanned.

“...hi,” said the adventurer. Her face was darkened by a slight blush-- embarrassment at Thancred’s antics, no doubt.

***

Y’shtola learned a few more things about the adventurer as she and Minfilia worked out the particulars of her recruitment into the Scions of the Seventh Dawn. Her name was Rinh Panipahr. A Keeper of the Moon, born and raised in the Black Shroud. Not in Gridania or its environs, though-- the deep woods, where sunlight barely pierced the canopy of boughs above. She came to Ul’dah five years ago-- and those were her words, _“five years ago”_ , carefully talking around the Calamity. Everyone knew what that meant-- even _Yda_ wasn’t so tactless as to pry further. She had a young son, apparently, although she’d left him in the care of a brother back in Limsa Lominsa when she’d journeyed to the Waking Sands. “You know,” she said, “In case this was just an elaborate trap, or something.” She laughed, but there was an edge of genuine apprehension.

Y’shtola knew she wasn’t the best at reading people-- she wasn’t like Thancred, who took to gladhanding strangers like a fish in water, or Yda, whose headstrong confidence was able to propel her through all but the most awkward social interactions. She was well aware she could come across as curt or brusque without meaning to-- although, of course, very often she came across as curt or brusque while very specifically meaning to. Only people who’d known her for years could really tell the difference.

She supposed Rinh was a bit intimidated by her, then, even though it was hardly Y’shtola’s intention-- she liked the gladiator well enough, she supposed, and certainly had faith in her ability to contribute to the Scion’s great project.

It didn’t really matter, though. Adventurers were always coming and going from the Waking Sands, and this Keeper of the Moon was just one face among many.

* * *

**Rinh**

The sun was shining in Costa Del Sol. Rinh had long since gotten used to sunlight-- all those long years in Thanalan had seen to that-- but her eyes were still more suited to the dark. The weather was nice, at least. It almost always seemed to be in La Noscea-- that cool breeze blowing in off the ocean blunted the sun’s bright heat.

Anyway, the weather hardly mattered compared to the feast that had been spread out before her, courtesy of the Company of Heroes.

She had just poured herself another glass of wine of a vintage as rich as unicorn’s blood when she noticed Y’shtola had drifted away from the proceedings, sitting down alone on a bench under a shady canopy.

She’d rather talk to Y’shtola than anyone in the Company, who were still near-strangers to her. She took a few steps towards the Archon before a thought occurred to her. She backtracked, picked up the wine bottle, and set it down on the bench beside Y’shtola. Wordlessly, she refilled the other woman’s empty glass before taking a seat next to her.

“You seem rather comfortable here,” Y’shtola said, expression unreadable as she raised the glass to her lips, “Considering the circumstances.”

“Oh,” said Rinh, “I might be enjoying the feast, but the _circumstances_ are terrible. I wouldn’t relish playing errand-girl to satisfy some stupid mercenary tradition even if it _didn’t_ mean sitting idle while an unchecked primal is off gorging itself on aether and doing Twelve-knows-what. I’ve had my fill of dancing to the tune of men like Gegejeru in Ul’dah, thanks.”

“...but?” Y’shtola said, eyebrow quirked.

“But,” Rinh said, smiling wanly, “I’m not going to say no to all this food. Especially if it’s _meant_ for me, right? Or for ‘Rinh Panipahr, Titan’s Bane’, I guess. The title’s maybe just a _bit_ premature, but if I _am_ to face the lord of the crags, I might as well do it with a full belly.” 

“Ah,” said Y’shtola. She had the slightest hint of a smile on her face, too, which by now Rinh knew was a sign Y’shtola was _thoroughly_ amused-- by Y’shtolian standards, anyroad. “How very pragmatic of you, _‘Titan’s Bane’._ ”

“Now, look here,” said Rinh, after taking a lengthy sip from her wineglass, “I just-- I don’t like wasting food, that’s all. Especially it’s been offered to me, specifically.”

“‘Offered’ to you after you did all the work, one can’t help but notice,” said Y’shtola, rolling her eyes.

“Even more reason not to let it go to waste, then!” said Rinh. She felt a bit hot in the face-- perhaps, she thought, she’d had _slightly_ too much wine. She was too proud to admit it, though.

A silence just long enough to be awkward elapsed.

“What was the Y tribe like?” Rinh blurted out, finally.

“The _‘Y tribe’_ ?” Y’shtola asked, “ _Really,_ Rinh?”

“I mean, we met the U— and obviously I can’t imagine they’re anything like the Y. I haven’t got any first-hand knowledge of Sharlayan, but I’ve read a lot about it, and I’m given to understand that it’s not very much like the southern reaches of the Sagolii Desert--”

“No, they’re exactly the same,” Y’shtola said drily, “The only difference is the drakes all have tenure.”

“--and _anyroad,_ ” Rinh continued, “Even if I _couldn’t_ make reasonable inferences about Sharlayan in general, I know that every Keeper of the Moon family is different, and I’m sure Seeker tribes are the same, even if they’re bigger and not so isolated as we are-- so, seeing the U tribe still made me curious.”

Y’shtola looked ready to unleash another barb, but then her expression softened-- she’d thought better of it, evidently. “In all honesty,” she said, softly, “It was less a tribe and more an _ex post facto_ attempt to project traditional tribal structures onto the serial philandering and dalliances of Y’rhul Nunh.”

“Sorry,” Rinh murmured, feeling like she’d stepped over a line she wasn’t meant to.

“It’s all right. I don’t care,” Y’shtola said. “When you get right down to it, my mentor at the Studium did the yeoman’s work of raising me. Don’t tell her I said that, though. And it’s not as if I lack for family-- I’m on perfectly good terms with my half-sister, of course, but most of those I consider family came to me later in life.”

“Oh yeah?” Rinh said, draining the remaining contents of her glass, “What are they like?”

Y’shtola favored Rinh with another of her rare smiles. “You’ve met them already.”


	2. seventh astral

**Rinh**

“Is this near where you grew up?” Y’shtola asked, fallen leaves crinkling underfoot with every step.

“Sort of. We were this far east, so we could see _that_ eyesore—” Rinh said, indicating the distant lights and looming cermet ramparts of Baelsar’s Wall with a sweeping gesture, “But south of here, well removed from any settled Gridanian folk, where the Shroud starts to thin out a bit. There’s less game down there, but also fewer Wood Wailers. Or—” Her face fell. “—or there _were_ , anyroad. It’s all long gone, now.” Too many of her stories only existed in past tense, she thought, too many of her life’s threads were cut by Dalamud’s fall. Everything since then felt disjointed, like she was lurching abruptly from one self to the next; from hunter to refugee to gladiator, from adventurer to hero to _Warrior of Light_.

The title didn’t sit well with her, if she was being honest with herself. It felt as hollow as the supposed _Seventh Astral Era_ the leaders of Eorzea proclaimed after scarcely five years of the Seventh Umbral had passed, when everything was still _completely_ fucked up from the Calamity. A declaration of victory in a war that had barely begun, a savior anointed in a realm with no salvation in sight.

Y’shtola said nothing, expression taciturn as ever, but she gently placed her hand on Rinh’s arm. They spent some time walking in comfortable, companionable silence.

“I guess talking to me must feel like a bloody minefield, huh?” Rinh said, after she’d collected herself a bit. “Sorry about that.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Y’shtola said, “Nor are you obliged to talk about anything you’re not comfortable with.”

“Remembering’s hard,” Rinh said, “But forgetting’s way worse. We always believed— we _believe_ , rather— that no one is ever really gone, that the Panipahr ghosts will look after the living if we tell their stories.” She shrugged. “I just need to… pace myself, that’s all.”

“Speaking of pacing ourselves, it’s probably time to take another set of aetheric readings,” said Y’shtola, “We must be at least a malm away from the last ones by now.”

Rinh carefully— and rather reluctantly, truth be told— extricated herself from Y’shtola’s hand on her arm. She opened up her satchel and rummaged around for her aetheroscope— a compact, rugged-looking unit she could stow away when not in use. Y’shtola, like most of the Sharlayan Scions, had a more ostentatious device worn on a strap, but since part of the Warrior of Light’s job description was being hit by swords constantly, she’d decided having a delicate magical instrument exposed on her person was _probably_ a bad idea.

She raised her aetheroscope to her eyes and peered through it, looking this way and that. The novelty of observing aether with her own two eyes still hadn’t worn off— the Shroud was a riot of light and color. Trees were sparkling waterfalls; animals were pinwheels of aether leaving cascading ripples in their wake. A subtle current flowed through everything, everywhere— the visible traces of the Lifestream’s rushing waters. And— even more faintly— enormous silhouettes slowly drifted past, like the shadows of leviathans. There were a great many things in the Black Shroud that were vast and terrible and old, often unseen but never unfelt.

“It’s settled down a lot now that Ramuh’s been sorted,” said Rinh, “It’s still elevated over the baseline, though.”

“Mn,” hummed Y’shtola, lost in thought and— frankly— looking slightly ridiculous with her enormous aetheroscope covering her entire face.

“Could be nothing,” said Rinh, “Or just leftovers from Ramuh that haven’t dispersed yet. Or maybe we’re just standing downstream from someone practicing their thaumaturgy.”

Y’shtola lowered her aertheroscope, her silver hair left in slight disarray by the straps. “It’s beyond the level of variance one would expect from the natural ebb and flow of aether, in any case.”

“Think it’s cause for concern, Y’shtola? You’ve got a better eye for aether than I do...”

“I’m not seeing the sort of spikes that would require _immediate_ action,” Y’shtola said, folding her arms, “However, we should present these readings to Papalymo and Urianger upon our return to Vesper Bay— perhaps between the four of us, a clearer picture will emerge.”

Rinh’s ear twitched; somewhere nearby, a twig snapped underfoot. She stopped dead, sniffing at the air.

Her blood ran cold: A whiff of ceruleum. 

She looked back at Y’shtola, one hand held up: _Stop. Danger nearby._ The older scion took out her conjurer’s branch; Rinh drew her sword and raised her shield.

Three magitek bits came screaming out from amidst the trees. Y’shtola was ready for it, though— with one quick motion she sent a boulder humming with aether hurtling towards the formation of flying machina. Upon impact, the bits’ own speed became a liability— they were utterly pulverized. The debris that rained down was barely recognizable as something man-made, much less the remnants of sophisticated magitek drones.

“Nice shot,” said Rinh, grinning, “Careful— there’s still at least one on foot, though.”

The crack of a shot rang out. A startled flock of crows took off from the boughs; what little sunlight got through the forest canopy was blotted out by black-feathered wings.

Rinh heard a sharp cry behind her, followed by the sound of a body hitting a blanket of dead leaves.

A second shot ricocheted harmlessly off of Rinh’s armor, which apparently really _did_ live up to the rather outlandish claims of protection from small arms fire its Ironworks designers had made. She barreled towards where the shot came from, shield first, expending a bit of aether to give it a little more momentum than her muscles alone provided. It was more than enough to knock the Garlean taking cover in the underbrush off his feet. Disoriented, he scrambled to retrieve his rifle and scoot away from her.

Rinh raised her sword.

The legionary, arm outstretched towards his gun, looked up at her. His eyes widened. “Oh _fuck_ , it’s the eikon slay—”

Rinh’s sword swung down.

She immediately turned on her heel and rushed back to Y’shtola’s side, silently praying to every ghost that called these woods home that the conjurer yet lived.

Y’shtola still laid where she fell. Her pristine white dalmatica was spattered with blood. But her eyes were open and tracking Rinh’s movements, and her chest was still rising and falling in shallow breaths.

“W-well,” said Y’shtola, as the Warrior of Light knelt by her side, “It… it _could_ have gone worse.” Rinh took stock of her friend’s injuries; she’d been shot in the side, apparently— nothing vital seemed to have been hit.

But she was bleeding quite badly, and looked to be in terrible pain. Rinh felt a rising sense of panic, but with a deep breath she forced herself to calm down. 

She could still fix this. 

She could _fix_ this.

She clasped Y’shtola’s hand in hers. Nothing about the gesture was ideal— Y’shtola’s grip was weakening by the second, and Rinh was still wearing an unwieldy gauntlet, but it was at least some semblance of an anchor between the two women.

With her free hand, Rinh picked up Y’shtola’s conjurer’s branch and began to weave aether in patterns she hadn’t since before Dalamud fell. The bleeding slowed, then stopped. Y’shtola’s hand held hers more tightly. The pain seemed to drain from her features.

“I’m not half the conjurer _you_ are,” Rinh murmured, “but this should get you back on your feet for now, at least.” Y’shtola draped her arm across Rinh’s shoulders, and Rinh gingerly helped her stand up. “We should get moving— if Castrum Oriens is sending out patrols again, there might be more about. Amarissaix’s Spire is just to the south— we can get help there. Here, lean on me— it’s okay.”

Getting to Amarissaix’s was slower-going than Rinh would have liked. Supporting Y’shtola’s weight was easy enough, but Rinh still moved cautiously, keeping an eye out for any other Garleans— or any of the other more ordinary dangers of the Shroud, for that matter: large predators with a taste for miqo’te, vengeful spirits of old Gelmorra, poachers, or— worst of all— Wood Wailers who thought _she_ was a poacher. One would hope that _literally being the Warrior of bloody Light_ would cancel out being a Keeper of the Moon in the Wailers’ eyes, but she didn’t particularly want to put that to the test— not with Y’shtola depending on her, anyway.

Eventually, though, the two miqo’te could just about make out the spire rising above the treeline. With a little more walking— and one extremely awkward conversation with the Wailers stationed there— they were safe.

***

It was a few hours later. Y’shtola’s wounds had been seen to by a proper conjurer, but she still needed to rest for a while. She reclined on a cot, while the Warrior of Light sat up on the neighboring cot.

“I wasn’t aware you counted conjury amongst your many talents,” Y’shtola said.

Rinh smiled softly. “I was my aunt’s apprentice before— well, _before_.”

“Ah,” said Y’shtola, “She was your clan’s healer, I assume?”

“Midwife, actually,” Rinh answered, a note of pride in her voice, “And not just for _our_ family— Aunt Sizha delivered children for Keepers all over the southeastern Shroud.”

Y’shtola closed her eyes. “I have her to thank for saving my life too, then.”

Rinh grinned. “She’d be glad to hear it. It’s like I said— our ghosts look after the living, Y’shtola.”

Y’shtola was quiet for a moment, looking as if she was deliberating with herself over some thorny dilemma. “You may call me Shtola, if you’d like,” she said, finally, “There’s no reason to stand on formality between us, after all.”

* * *

**Y’shtola**

“So,” said Thancred, leaning against the wall, as infuriatingly casual as ever, “What do you think of our esteemed champion?”

The sun was setting over Ul’dah. The spires and domes were thrown into sharp relief— half painted in golden light, half shrouded in deepening shadow. With the day’s heat fading and the splendid view the balcony Thancred had found afforded, Y’shtola thought, Ul’dah was actually _almost_ tolerable.

“She is an inspiration to us all,” Y’shtola said, cautiously, “A hero who’s saved this realm on innumerable occasions, a dear friend, and a shining light—”

Thancred scoffed. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

“I know that’s not what you mean,” Y’shtola conceded with a sigh. “ _However_ , for the time being, I am content to admire her from afar.”

“What, really?” Thancred said, dubious. He raised two fingers to his ear, as if he was speaking over a linkpearl. “Excuse me, could you put _Y’shtola_ on the line? I seem to have accidentally been connected to some shrinking violet I’ve never met in my life.”

“ _Thancred_ ,” Y’shtola said.

“I’m just saying—” he replied, “I thought you were bolder than that.”

“Shut up.”

“ _Y’shtola’s decisive,_ I thought,” Thancred said, “ _A real woman of action, who always knows just what she wants.”_

Y’shtola sighed the same long-suffering sigh most conversations with Thancred Waters eventually drove her to. “What I _want_ is to not create complications and unwelcome entanglements for a woman upon whom so much depends.”

Thancred rolled his eyes. “Oh, I’m sure all Eorzea’s grateful for your noble self-sacrifice on the Warrior of Light’s behalf.”

“ _Anyroad_ ,” Y’shtola said, “I don’t even know if— if she favors the company of women.”

“Y’shtola, please,” said Thancred, “She’s a Keeper of the bloody Moon, of _course_ she does.”

Y’shtola folded her arms, skeptical. “The only past romantic connection she’s mentioned even in _passing_ is the father of her son.” 

Over the long months they’d been working together as Scions, the story of Rinh’s life before the Calamity came out in dribs and drabs. Y’shtola never pried, of course; she’d seen the way an ill-timed question or thoughtless comment could make Rinh freeze up, and the thought of being _responsible_ for that sort of distress was extremely upsetting. So every time the Warrior _did_ choose to confide some bit of her past to Y’shtola, it felt like a gift, a token of trust, a secret shared between friends.

Y’shtola had met Rinh’s son several times by now— Rinh’a Panipahr was a shy lad some five summers old and possessed of bottomless curiosity about Limsa Lominsa, where his mother made her home when she wasn’t rushing hither and yon across Eorzea, slaying primals and legates. The boy’s father was still something of a mystery to Y’shtola, though. He existed as a collage of scattershot details— his name was Koh’sae Ganajai, and he was a wandering adventurer— a bard, apparently— a few years older than Rinh. 

And he died in the Calamity.

Y’shtola had seen the Calamity first-hand, of course, bearing witness to the terrifying spectacle of Bahamut’s fury raining down upon Limsa Lominsa’s whitewashed towers, the world itself set ablaze. And she’d seen all the hardships of the aftermath, the scars— to the land and people both— that would never heal, not really. All these years later, she still felt an ache in her heart whenever she saw the shattered remnants of Tupsimati, utterly inert in their glass display case.

But it was still hard for her to fathom the near-totality with which the Calamity represented a breaking point in the life of the Warrior of Light. Out of all the people Rinh told stories about— Auntie Sizha, midwife, witch, and wisewoman; her mother, the family matriarch and a deadly markswoman; sisters, cousins, nieces and nephews— the only one who Rinh knew to be alive was her brother, an assessor at Melvaan’s Gate, who’d been with his Seeker of the Sun father when Dalamud fell.

The closest point of comparison Y’shtola could think of was the evacuation of the Sharlayan colony back to the motherland, which was an enormous disruption to her life, the exclamation point that ended her youth. But even then, the threads connecting her to that time were stretched thin, but not broken. Old Sharlayan was much like New Sharlayan— the Studium, Archons holding court, academic feuds that last decades. And she was but one among many in the exodus— most of her friends and family found themselves in the Old World, too. Leaving Matoya behind was— if Y’shtola is being honest with herself— a blow, but it was softened by the knowledge that in all likelihood her mentor was still in a cave, enchanting brooms and frogs, reading hoarded books, maintaining her lonely, stubborn vigil over Sharlayan’s abandoned secrets. Perhaps, one day, circumstances would conspire to bring Y’shtola to Dravania’s hinterlands, and she could call on the irascible old Archon.

But the people who shaped Rinh’s mind were ash; ash, dust, and ghosts.

“You should just _say_ something to her,” Thancred said, shaking Y’shtola from her reverie, “Nothing ventured, nothing gained, eh?”

Y’shtola frowned, arms folded. “One cannot gamble without staking something precious.”

“Come _on,_ I don’t mean you should make some sort of passionate declaration of eternal devotion,” said Thancred, “Just… ask her to dance, or something. Tonight, even.”

Y’shtola laughed. “I’m _certain_ this isn’t going to be that sort of party.”

“Every party is that sort of party once everyone’s got enough wine in ‘em,” Thancred said breezily.

Y’shtola shook her head. “It’s a formal diplomatic banquet, Thancred. The only _courting_ I expect to see is the Alliance’s leaders trying to woo Ishgard back into the fold.”

“And _I_ expect to see the Fragrant Chamber filled with liquored-up political and military leaders. Everyone’s going to be in the mood to celebrate the victory at the Steps— Rinh’s going to be the belle of the ball. So if _you_ don’t make a move, someone else will.”

Somewhere in the distance, a bell tower began to toll; it was eight o’ clock. The feast would be starting imminently, if it hadn’t already.

“You’d better get a move on, Y’shtola,” Thancred said, “ _I_ plan on being fashionably late, but you won’t be fashionably anything in those shoes, so chop chop.”

Y’shtola aimed a gentle kick at Thancred’s shin. “My shoes are the singular creation of a gifted leatherworking artisan! They’re one-of-kind.”

“Yes, and for good reason,” Thancred said, smirking, “Too late to do anything about it, though. You’re expected in the Fragrant Chamber and _pronto._ ”

Y’shtola sighs. “I shall take my leave, then. But _tomorrow_ , we’re going to talk about your extraordinarily unwelcome attempt to play matchmaker to the Scions.”

Thancred waved her off.

The stars over Thanalan were beautiful.


	3. the bloodsands

**Y’shtola**

The warrior of light’s dress was beautiful.

An absurd thing to notice, thought Y’shtola, given the circumstances. The banquet had descended into utter chaos— the Ishgardian delegation hustled out of the chamber by a party of armed Temple Knights. Raubahn— mighty Raubahn— paralyzed with shock as Teledji Adeledji (who, Rinh once told her, owed the warrior of light 500 gil for a shift spent moonlighting as security, as many gladiators did, at the Platinum Mirage) needled him over the Sultana’s death.

And Rinh Panipahr— free paladin, Scion of the Seventh Dawn, slayer of primals, vanquisher of the XIV Legion, the celebrated Warrior of Light— tossed roughly to the ground by a phalanx of Crystal Braves, arms bound behind her back.

And wearing a lovely red dress.

Y’shtola knew she’d agonized over what to wear. Her Scion comrades all attended in their customary dress— looking elegant was far less important than visibly and unambiguously appearing as the Scions of the Seventh Dawn. Even now, Yda’s armored boots clanked softly as she warily shifted her feet as the probability of having to punch everyone in the Fragrant Chamber between the Scions and the door steadily increased.

But Rinh was surprisingly fastidious about her appearance. She wore makeup whenever time and circumstances allowed. When she wasn’t in her armor, her clothes tended towards the dapper and fashionable: tailored suits, elegant dresses, rich fabrics. And even her  _ armor _ was color-coordinated— black and white, to match her fellow Scions.

Making a striking impression at the banquet was especially important to Rinh. When you’ve starved and fought and bled and killed and suffered for Ul’dah’s wealthiest, she confessed to Y’shtola, when you’ve seen the city’s alleged best and brightest in their luxury boxes at the Coliseum, dressed in rich silks and glittering jewelry and baying for blood, the temptation to come back with your head held high and better dressed than  _ any _ of those tacky bastards was overwhelming.

And here she was in her dress— a dark, wine-red evening gown, high-collared but revealing a tasteful amount of décolletage, floor length but slit up to the hipbone-- lying on a cold stone floor at the feet of one of the wealthiest men on the Syndicate.

Y’shtola was almost as enraged at the sheer humiliation of it as she was by the spurious accusations of regicide. Although, she assumed, the latter was much more consequential in the great scheme of things.

Teledji Adeleji, Y’shtola was sorry to say, had played his cards magnificently in a game the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, for all their collected wisdom, hadn’t even realized had begun. But, for some reason, he couldn’t resist gloating, self-satisfied at outflanking the Royalists as he was.

Raubahn’s shock turned to horror, and then into rage. And then, in a flash, Tizona was unsheathed, Raubahn lunged, and Teledji Adeledji was cleft in twain.

For a moment, there was nothing but stunned silence. Y’shtola found herself wondering how Teledji Adeledji deliberately goading the grieving Flame General played into his plan, unless its end goal was  _ suicide-by-Raubahn _ .

Then, all hell broke loose. The gathered dignitaries and aristocrats screamed. Raubahn turned on another monetarist Syndicate member, murderous intent in his eyes. Ilberd, captain of the Crystal Braves, drew his own sword and sliced off Raunahn’s arm in one swift, clean, terrible stroke. Kan-E-Senna and Merlwyb were all but forced by their guard detail to quit the scene. The Bull of Ala Mhigo staggered to his feet again, though, and the two highlanders were locked in a whirlwind of a duel; every wild stroke that missed its mark had the strength to break the very ground the men stood upon. Dust and debris filled the air.

But, in the chaos, the Brass Blades and Crystal Braves regulars had scattered.

And Rinh was left unattended.

Y’shtola just had to get to her. Get to her, and...

Well, she’d think of the  _ and _ later; she didn’t have a plan beyond  _ get to Rinh, _ but that would be a start, at least. So much depended on her, so many hopes were borne on her slender shoulders. Her life was precious-- to the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, to all the realm.

To Y’shtola.

Raubahn, evidently, had the same idea. There was a brief lull in the fighting as he and Ilberd caught their breath. Ilberd looked to have the advantage, but the very fact he was so hard-pressed by a man who’d just had his arm lopped off spoke to the Bull’s sheer resilience. As the duelists circled one another, Raubahn positioned himself near the warrior of light. Then, with one precise, delicate stroke of Tizona, he cut her bonds. Y’shtola was there a moment later; she took Rinh’s hands in hers and helped her friend to her feet.

Rinh kicked off her high-heels. When she took a place at Raubahn’s flank, Y’shtola realized, to her dawning horror, that Rinh looked as if she was going to fling herself into the fray, as if she thought she could somehow prevail in a fight against Ilbred and some dozen Blades and Braves armed with nothing but her bare hands and an evening dress. Her fangs were bared, her golden eyes lit with the sort of fire Y’shtola had only ever seen when she was about to face down a Primal.

Rinh was a paladin-- a flash of light to illuminate the darkest shadows, Eorzea’s shining shield. Of  _ course _ her first instinct when faced with danger was to put herself in front of it, Y’shtola realized-- protecting others came to her as naturally as breathing air.

It was an instinct Y’shtola admired, fiercely, proudly-- but, if acted upon, it was almost certainly going to get her cut down where she stood.

Ilberd began to advance on Raubahn again, his blade sparking dangerously with aether.

Y’shtola put her hand on Rinh’s arm, ready to drag her out of the Fragrant Chamber, if needs be (after all, how much could she possibly weigh without armor?), but a firm, steadying touch was all it took for Rinh to take a deep breath, relax her stance, and take a halting step back towards the door. She takes a second deep breath. Her eyes swept the room, alert and focused, until she found her fellow Scions in the crowd, themselves making their way to the exit.

“ _ Go!”  _ thundered Raubahn, “Clear your names!”

Rinh spared one last glance for Raubahn. She made a gesture that Y’shtola couldn’t recognize, but looked to be a sort of salute. Some gladiator thing, probably. The bloodsands were common ground between them, even if their time there was decades apart. “Give ‘em a show to remember, Bull,” she said, before turning decisively towards the door, beckoning her comrades to follow.

They’re already halfway around the Hustings Strip when Y’shtola realized she’d never let go of Rinh’s arm.

***

“Ul’dah,” Rinh said, voice echoing in the cavernous tunnel, “Of _course_ this happens in _fucking_ _Ul’dah.”_

The Scions were deep underground, hurrying down a secret escape route built, apparently, by the Sil’dihns. Or that was what the bits of architecture Y’shtola could see looked like. Otherwise, it looked, sounded, and smelled like a sewer; the hem of Rinh’s expensive dress trailed through stagnant wastewater. Y’shtola’s shoes, which she still perfectly liked despite Thancred’s slander earlier that evening, a million years ago, were  _ thoroughly  _ ruined. If she gets out of this, she thought, she really ought to get herself some higher boots.

The tunnel was nearly pitch black, save for a guttering lantern Thancred held. It swayed erratically as he ran, illuminating in turn each of Y’shtola’s companions. There was Minfilia’s worried face, there was Thancred’s determined one. There was Rinh’s back; she’d taken point— her eyes had already adapted to the dark, and she likely didn’t want to be blinded if a lantern shined in her face.

The light never found Yda or Papalymo, though. The last Y’shtola had seen of them was an iron gate slamming shut as a wave of Brass Blades was about to crash upon them.

“Blood and money,” Rinh said, voice punctuated with the sloshing of water, “Everything in Ul’dah comes down to blood and money. This godsdamned city’ll suck you dry of both, and swallow up your empty husk.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Thancred, “Ul’dah has its finer points, too.”

“ _ Thancred _ ,” Y’shtola snapped, impatiently, “I don’t think the quality of the city’s pillowhouses is  _ particularly _ relevant to our current situation.”

“That’s not  _ quite _ what I—” Thancred began, before he was cut off by Rinh laughing. A hollow, broken, exhausted laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.

“Honestly,” said Rinh, “I’d trust those girls with my life over anyone else in this bloody viper pit of a city. To the Ul’dahn aristocracy, courtesans and gladiators are just two sides of the same coin.”

“Yes, well,” Thancred huffed, “As the window of opportunity for backtracking and linking up with a crack battalion of pillowhouse girls has sadly closed, we’d better keep moving.”

“After we get out of these tunnels, think we should make a break for Vesper Bay?”  asked Rinh, “Urianger’s still there, right?”

Minfilia nodded. “His counsel and aid would be invaluable now…”

“The Brass Blades are surely there in force,” Y’shtola cut in.

“Right,” added Thancred, “It’s a safe bet that the town with a giant statue of Lolorito in it is hostile territory!”

“We can’t just  _ abandon  _ Urianger,” Minfilia said, “We’ve already lost too many this day.”

“We could  _ warn  _ him, at least,” Rinh said, “The Crystal Braves took my linkpearl when they searched me, but you lot have probably still got yours—”

“Are you kidding?” Thancred said, incredulously, “It’s trivial to intercept linkshell messages with the right equipment.”

“And the Crystal Braves  _ assuredly  _ have the right equipment,” Y’shtola added, curtly.

Rinh frowned. “All right, all right, I  _ get _ it, everything is completely and irredeemably fucked.”

“So long as a single light still shines,” Minfilia said solemnly, “Dawn will one day come.”

For Y’shtola, this was a reminder of what it meant to be a Scion of the Seventh Dawn— a reminder to steel herself for what might be asked of her in the near future. But she’s spent enough time with Rinh to tell that her vocal frustration was just a flimsy mask over a rising sense of panic. She was seeking not inspiration, but reassurance; concrete facts rather than abstract ideals.

So Y’shtola said, “Urianger surely had contingencies in place for any sort of attack on the Waking Sands; I know that prior incidents weighed heavily on his mind, and he would not brook their repetition.”

And, sure enough, this seemed to quell Rinh’s worries— her strides through the muck were more confident, the doubt on her face hardened into determination.

Y’shtola’s ears twitched; a noise, behind them and approaching fast. One glance in Rinh’s direction was enough to tell she’d heard it, too— miqo’te might not have the preternatural hearing lalafells had, but their ears were still more sensitive than those of either of the hyur in their party.

“Someone’s coming,” Rinh murmured, “Sounds like a dozen at  _ least _ .”

And then Thancred’s lantern was joined by a second beacon of light cutting through the darkness—a small army of Brass Blades and Crystal Braves had just rounded a corner and was bearing down on them.

“You two go on ahead,” said Y’shtola, as Thancred handed his lantern over to Minfilia, “Thancred and I will deal with this.”

“Shtola--” Rinh began; the dropped  _ Y, _ a token of affection in better times, landed like a blow on Y’shtola, “You can’t seriously mean to--”

“ _ Rinh, _ ” Y’shtola said, taking the younger woman’s hands in hers, “You need to protect the Antecedent.” Then, when Rinh showed so sign of budging, she added, “We’ll catch up with you-- now  _ go. _ ”

Rinh hesitated for a moment, her golden eyes meeting Y’shtola’s teal ones, as if trying to commit the sight of them to memory. Then, she nodded silently, gave Y’shtola’s hands one last squeeze, and took off down the corridor, Minfilia in tow.

It would be a shame, Y’shtola thought, if the very last thing she ever said to Rinh Panipahr was a lie. She knew that-- barring a miracle-- she and Thancred would be dead within minutes. But if that’s what it took to deliver the warrior of light and the antecedent to safety, well, then, surely it was worth it.

“What is the plan, milady?” Thancred said, drawing his knives, dropping into a fighting stance, “Shall I take the dozen on the left, and you the dozen on the right? The odds are not exactly stacked in our favor…”

Aether began to converge within Y’shtola’s cupped hands. “Numbers will count for little when I bring the tunnel down upon their heads. Though I cannot say I relish the thought of being entombed with  _ you  _ for all eternity.”

“You wound me!” Thancred grinned, “I will have you know that many a maid would  _ kill  _ for the chance to spend forever at my side!” By this point, the enemy was almost upon them; Y’shtola could see the brass buckles on the Braves’s greatcoats glimmering by the light of the lanterns they carried. “Now, may I have the last dance?”

Steel flashed.

Blood spilled into the Sil’dihn waterway.

A blinding light. The rumbling of collapsing masonry.

Y’shtola felt herself born away on the swift currents of the Lifestream.

* * *

**Rinh**

A blinding light. The rumbling of collapsing masonry.

A golden goblet falls to the ground.

A golden goblet falls to the ground. A sword slices through bone and flesh. An iron gate slams shut. A blinding light, and the rumbling of collapsing masonry. The voice of Hydaelyn calls one of her daughters home.

These moments kept repeating themselves in Rinh’s head, far more vivid than anything happening in the present. She was as a distant spectator watching herself emerge from the tunnels and into the chilly Thanalan night, finding Alphinaud and Raubahn’s son.  _ (A sword slices through bone and flesh.) _

A chocobo-drawn wagon pulled up. She barely noticed the gentle hands helping her aboard. She watched herself sit across from the very merchant who’d brought her to Ul’dah in the first place, years ago.  _ (A golden goblet falls to the ground.) _ Surely, she thought, this was a sign she was dreaming.

The ride to Black Brush Station took either thirty seconds or twelve hours. Alphinaud was saying something, but his voice had faded into a soft white noise.  _ (The voice of Hydaelyn calls one of her daughters home.) _ The wagon bobbed gently beneath her as it raced through the night; maybe it wasn’t a wagon at all, but a boat. Or an airship, perhaps? Yes, definitely an airship; Cid Garlond was at its helm; its hull shuddered as it lifted itself from the ground.  _ (An iron gate slams shut.) _

Thanalan dropped away beneath them. Nothing seemed to exist anymore beyond an endless sea of clouds, set ablaze by the first glimmers of the rising sun.  _ (A blinding light, and the rumbling of collapsing masonry.) _

She watched, with passing interest, as she sank to her knees on the deck and began to slump forward.

Darkness overtook her.

***

She’d passed out aboard the  _ Enterprise _ , Cid had told her, as they began to descend towards Coerthas. For one brief, glorious moment, she thought that perhaps  _ everything _ that had happened in Ul’dah was a dream-- a lurid nightmare instantly banished by the morning’s light.

It wasn’t, of course. In one horrible night, her world had been dashed to pieces. Yda, Papalymo, Thancred, Minfilia,  _ Shtola--  _ all gone now. Dead, more likely than not.

It seemed deeply unfair, Rinh thought, that this had happened to her a second time. She hadn’t learned her lesson from the Calamity, maybe; she’d let herself come to depend on others again, and brought nothing but doom upon all their heads.

“We should make for Camp Dragonhead,” Alphinaud said, more to fill the silence than anything else. The walls and spires of the Ishgardian fort already loomed over the snowy hills and leafless trees. There was nowhere else to go. It was either Camp Dragonhead, or just stand around in the Coerthan highlands waiting to freeze to death.

Which was a tempting possibility, given the circumstances.

But Rinh put one foot in front of the other. Then she did it again, and again. She tried thinking of what awaited her at Camp Dragonhead-- a warm fire in a hearth, the hospitality of Haurchefant Graystone.

A fucking  _ coat,  _ maybe.

But even these simple comforts felt too far away to hold onto, abstract possibilities in a remote future.

So she did what she did after the Calamity. One foot in front of the other, over and over again, until she no longer felt the flames at her back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thancred and y'shtola's last exchange is, of course, verbatim from the 2.55 msq, but i felt like i had to include it since it was more or less exactly the way i've been writing their dynamic so far


	4. the silent regard of stars

**Y’shtola**

The Lifestream was a blinding torrent of pure aether, without beginning or end, coursing through everywhere and nowhere.

And then Y’shtola heard birds singing— far away, seemingly, but unmistakable. A mourning dove. A lark. A murder of crows. More subtle sounds followed: the rustling of leaves, water flowing down a quiet stream. She felt a cool breeze hit her face, carrying the earthy scent of an old-growth forest. 

She was _somewhere_ again— somewhere full of sounds, scents, and sensations that made her think of Rinh Panipahr— the Black Shroud, surely.

Rinh herself was there, she realized. The world was hazy, still, like the Lifestream hadn’t quite released her from its grip, but its raging river of undifferentiated aether had begun to resolve itself into the more organized aetherial forms of living things. She _felt_ the warrior of light, even if she couldn’t see her. Her relief was profound and overwhelming; whatever else had happened, Rinh had emerged from Ul’dah hale and whole, so Y’shtola’s gamble in the tunnels had paid out in full.

She sensed a number of other familiar presences gathered nearby— Y’mhitra, Tatauru, and Alphinaud, and the less familiar but still instantly recognizable aether of Kan-E-Senna. She felt as if she was slowly sinking— and then, when she felt living soil and grass pressed against her bare skin, she realized she’d _literally_ been sinking to the ground, recaptured by the star’s gravity after so long adrift.

She was more exhausted than she’d ever been in her life; when one of the Seedseer’s guards rolled her up in a blanket and lifted her into their arms, she offered no resistance.

She just barely had enough energy to turn her head in Rinh's direction.

“I _said_ I’d catch up with you,” she murmured, nearly inaudibly.

And then she slept.

***

Y’shtola was sitting up on a soft bed in the Carmine Canopy’s finest suite. She still felt bone-tired, but it was an ordinary sort of tiredness, like she might feel after a day of strenuous activity, or a night spent burning the midnight oil on her Archon’s thesis.

The world looked different to her, now. Perhaps _look_ wasn’t even the right word to use, now— her mind was parsing not light through her eyes, but her perception of the aether around her. Some of the things around her felt unnaturally dim; the room’s furniture, once-living but now dead wood, looked shadowy and indistinct, coming into focus only where the echo of a craftsman’s care and attention left ripples in the aether. Living things, on the other hand, were luminous, dusted with delicate constellations of aether, more real-than-real.

And Rinh, who’d dozed off in an armchair in the middle of her bedside vigil, was more luminous than most. She opened her eyes sleepily, awakened by the sound of Y’shtola stirring in her bed; she always had been a light sleeper. “...Shtola?”

Once Y’shtola got past the vivid light of her aether, she could tell the younger woman had changed during her absence. Her hair was longer, now; when she’d watched Rinh vanish down a Sil’dihn tunnel, her hair had been cropped short— shorter than Y’shtola’s. Now, though, her hair was a dark curtain framing her face, nearly shoulder-length. She’d been lost in the Lifestream for several months at the very least, then.

Several eventful months, apparently. Beneath Rinh’s palpable relief at Y’shtola’s safe return, the weight of a heavy— and still raw— grief had settled upon her. The Panipahrs kept their ghosts close, Rinh often said, but some ghosts were especially close at hand.

“How fare you of late?” Y’shtola said.

“Well,” said Rinh, straightening her posture and sitting rather primly, “We’re trying to get to Azys Ala— the Archbishop and his knights were headed there, so we’re currently exploring options for breaching the aetherial barrier—”

Y’shtola shook her head. “I’ve already been apprised of our overall situation in its broad strokes. I’m asking after _you_ . How are _you?_ ”

Rinh smiled weakly. “Awful, honestly.” She seemed smaller in that moment— the warrior of light often felt larger-than-life, her actual four fulm ten ilm height notwithstanding— sitting in a chair built for an elezen, feet dangling off the ground, swimming in an Ishgardian cloak several sizes too large for her. Her fingers brushed over a brooch clasping the cloak shut; Y’shtola could just barely make out the arms of House Fortemps engraved upon it. “No sense dissembling when you’ll see right through me anyway, right? I’m thoroughly wretched— finding you again is honestly the only good thing to happen in _moons._ ”

“I’ve heard you haven’t found any of the others yet,” Y’shtola said, cautiously.

“No,” Rinh said, “Although you _were_ right about Urianger— he was holding down the fort at the Waking Sands just fine. But for those of us at the banquet? It’s just you, me, and Alphinaud.”

“I see. What happened to Minfilia, then?”

Rinh slumped back in her chair, looking up at the ceiling. “She— she said Hydaelyn spoke to her. In the tunnels, I mean, right after— after we last saw you. She told _me_ to keep going— that so much depended on me, specifically— but that the Mother asked her to remain behind. I don’t know why— our pursuers were still stuck behind several tonze of collapsed rubble, I could already feel the fresh air from the end of the tunnel on my face, but— but off she went. If Hydaelyn had Her reasons, She did not deign to elucidate them to me at any point.”

“I’m sorry,” Y’shtola said. As a Scion of the Seventh Dawn she fought in Hydaelyn’s name, of course, but the will of the Mother always felt obscure to her. She had a fairly dry understanding of the Echo as an aetheric phenomenon, but the Scions who had the truest insight into its mysteries were the ones who came up through the Path of the Twelve, not the Circle of Knowing.

“In the moment,” Rinh continued, “I was too numb to do anything except keep going forward. But when I finally had some time to stew in it, I was _furious.”_

Y’shtola raised an eyebrow. “At… Minfilia?”

“No,” said Rinh, taken aback, “No, no, _no_ , I was furious at— well, _myself,_ firstly, for not just— I don’t know— grabbing her and running? But mostly at _Hydaelyn_. Which I realize is a completely insane thing to say, but— it was like— it was like She didn’t _care_ that everyone else risked their lives to get the Antecedent out of the city safely— _She_ had something else in mind, so that was that. It was just so— so bloody _pointless._ ”

“We did what we did to protect _you,_ as well,” Y’shtola said softly, “And— here you are, hale and whole.”

Rinh buried her face in her hands. “Why _me_ , though? What’s so special about _me?_ ”

“Because—” Y’shtola began, but Rinh cut her off.

“And don’t say it’s because _oh, because you’re the warrior of light_ , since that— that’s not _me._ It’s a title they put on me, and— and I play the part, I have to, but— but I was just _lucky.”_ Her voice was raw; she sounded on the cusp of tears. “And— and I ask— why _me?_ Why did I get to survive the Calamity when my mum and my aunt and my sisters and— and my nieces and nephews all died in the flames? What makes me different from all the gladiators who died on the bloodsands— some _at my hand,_ or different from all the adventurers who got killed on their first big job?” She stifled a sob. “Why am _I_ the one Scion who just _had_ to get away, whose life was worth— worth everyone else putting so much on the line for?”

“I can only speak for myself,” Y’shtola said, “But I so readily risked my life to protect you because I care for you, dearly.”

At this, the dam burst; the warrior of light was crying freely now. Y’shtola scooted over on the bed and patted the space this opened up, a silent invitation for Rinh to sit alongside her. Rinh stood up from her chair and took a shaky step forward, before more or less collapsing onto the bed. She leaned against Y’shtola, resting her head on her shoulder.

“Much depends on you,” Y’shtola murmured, her fingers softly carding through Rinh’s dark hair, “And I shan’t patronize you by suggesting otherwise. But you must remember that the things expected of you are not, and never will be, all that you are, nor is your worth as a person predicated on them.”

“Haurchefant died for me,” Rinh said, abruptly.

“Tataru informed me of his death at the Vault,” Y’shtola said, as gently as she could, “But not the manner of his passing.” She went over the things she knew of Haurchefant Greystone already-- the bastard son of Count Edmond de Fortemps, and commander of the garrison at Camp Dragonhead. In this latter capacity, he’d apparently been quite helpful during Rinh and Alphinaud’s efforts bringing Garuda to heel, and again during the hunt for Lady Iceheart-- _Ysayle_ , now, she supposed-- and the events leading up to the defense of the Steps of Faith. His good word had brought Lord Commander Aymeric to the banquet in Ul’dah-- for all the good that did him. After that, Haurchefant was apparently the remaining Scions’ foot in the door for being taken in by House Fortemps.

A fairly dry set of facts painting a picture of a dependable ally, slain in the line of duty. Y’shtola knew she was missing something.

“After Ul’dah,” Rinh said, “We couldn’t go straight on to Ishgard. We were stuck in Camp Dragonhead for _ages_ while we waited for various sclerotic ecclesiastical bureaucrats to decide whether to open the gates for us or not. After a close call with some Crystal Braves, I realized not even Coerthas was safe. So my world began and ended at the walls of Camp Dragonhead. For months, Shtola— for _months._ I couldn’t get in touch with anyone in the outside world-- I couldn’t even send word to my _son._ ”

“And you and Haurchefant became close over this period, I presume.”

Rinh nodded. “Close. _Closer_ than close. I— I had to perform this role around everyone else, I had to keep it together— but with him, I let my guard down. He-- he loved me. And I… I think I loved him? Reluctant as I was to admit it. No, ‘reluctant’ isn’t the right word; _frightened_ would be more accurate.” She looked up at Y’shtola for a moment, cheeks streaked with tears, eyeliner running, before burying her face in the conjurer’s shoulder once more. “Since I— I’m not worth that sort of devotion, not when loving me is so dangerous. He— he— he loved me, and all he had to show for it in the end was a broken shield, and a spear of light meant for me.”

The aether around Rinh rippled frantically as her body was wracked by great, heaving sobs. Y’shtola was at a loss for words; her course of study at the Studium trained her to mend bodies, not minds. Matoya had honed many skills in her pupil, but bedside manner wasn’t one of them. It was all she could do to wrap the smaller woman in her arms; she could be her anchor in this storm, if nothing else.

Eventually, by ilms, Rinh’s trembling subsided by ilms; the aether flowing through her, though by no means placid, was no longer so tempestuous.

“Since then,” Rinh murmured, “I’ve had to be the Warrior of Light _constantly._ And— it’s just a role, it’s just performance. One which suits me better than the stage name and exotic persona my lanista cooked up for me in the Coliseum, but with just as much artifice. It’s _exhausting,_ Shtola. I was _already_ barely keeping it together after Ul’dah, and now— now I feel like I’m hanging by a thread.” She sniffled. “And… and now you’re back, and all of that just came tumbling out, even though _you’re_ the one who’s been adrift in the Lifestream. So… sorry.”

“My time in the Lifestream has taken a physical toll-- most of which shall be mended with time and rest, some I shall carry with me for much longer,” Y’shtola said. She realized she was probably coming across as blunt and matter-of-fact as ever, possibly to the detriment of the point she was trying to make. When she began speaking again, she took care to keep her tone of voice gentle, even when speaking the truth unflinchingly. “But time flows differently in the Lifestream than it does in the world of material things-- or, perhaps, it is more accurate to say that a soul unmoored perceives time differently than one anchored to her body. My ordeal began and ended in the blink of an eye, whereas you suffered through months of grief and anguish.”

“I… I suppose,” Rinh said, “Although I imagine that _also_ means that what happened in Ul’dah feels a lot more raw.”

“Yes,” said Y’shtola, never one to mince words, “But the burden of that pain is borne equally between us.”

They sat like that for a while, side-by-side, clinging to one another. Eventually, though, Rinh gently extricated herself from Y’shtola’s arms. She gave Y’shtola a searching look.

“We’ll find them, Shtola,” she said, with conviction in her voice that surprised Y’shtola in its intensity, “Thancred, Minfilia, Yda, Papalymo… we’ll find them.” She smiled, fangs showing. “We managed to pluck you from the the bloody Lifestream, which is _mind-bogglingly_ improbable— so I can’t imagine any of the others are out of our reach.”

Looking into the Warrior of Light’s bright eyes, Y’shtola could almost believe it.

* * *

**Rinh**

“It’s odd,” said Rinh, boots tapping on whitewashed cobblestones, “seeing a city this big so dark and quiet.” The cobbles, like everything else in Sharlayan, looked as if they had once been painstakingly laid out with geometrical perfection by mathematicians moonlighting as architects, but now were gradually drifting askew as the entropy of nature took hold. “I suppose it must be even stranger for you, Shtola. You saw this place in its prime.”

Y’shtola hummed contemplatively. “What’s left of Sharlayan is less familiar than I imagined it would be, although I cannot say how much of that is the toll taken by fifteen years of neglect, how much is simply my own memories of this place fading with the passage of time, and how much is the result of looking upon it with, quite literally, different eyes.”

It was a dark night; the only light came from a sliver of moon, and the bed of stars it rested upon. She’d asked Y’shtola to come along on a nighttime stroll along Sharlayan’s streets; neither of them could sleep after they’d settled into camp, and getting the lay of the land seemed a better use of time than spending the next several hours uselessly tossing and turning. Rinh could see perfectly well in the dark, of course, and Y’shtola— well, Rinh supposed aether shined just as brightly at dusk as at dawn.

Rinh gazed out towards the Cenotaph, still majestic atop its lofty rise, still instantly recognizable from the engravings of it she’d seen. “I always wanted to see Sharlayan, you know. It figured prominently in the history my aunt taught me— and a lot of her books on aetherology and such were written by Sharlayan scholars. I imagined myself sitting in cafés, sipping tea and listening to the finest minds in Eorzea debate theory, browsing the shelves of the Studium’s great libraries, utterly losing myself in the noble pursuit of pure knowledge, that sort of thing.”

Y’shtola smiled, clearly amused. “A very romantic view of our city; unfortunately, it’s one which falls apart under the slightest scrutiny.”

“I _may_ have idealized the place a bit,” Rinh admitted.

“Just a bit.”

“Cut me some slack, Shtola, I was— what— thirteen, maybe fourteen years old?” She shrugged. “Also, I had no idea that the place had already been abandoned for five years.”

Y’shtola raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t know?”

“My aunt’s library was pretty comprehensive, considering our meager circumstances, but we weren’t exactly getting books hot off the presses in our remote corner of the Shroud. In the histories I learned, Sharlayan was still one of Eorzea’s great city-states.”

“I suppose you were disappointed by our cowardice,” Y’shtola said coolly.

“‘Cowardice’ seems like a harsh word…” Rinh began, but Y’shtola shook her head.

“It is _too_ kind, if anything. Louisoix famously said, ‘To ignore the plight of those one might conceivably save is not wisdom— it is indolence.’ One would be hard-pressed to name a clearer example of such indolence than the decision to abandon Eorzea to its fate at the first sign of trouble. It was foolish— if Eorzea was subjugated by the empire, there is no reason to expect they would refrain from crossing the sea to strike at the motherland— but, more than that, it was _cruel._ The Forum elected to quit the continent, taking all of its assembled wisdom and power with it, while the citizens of Eorzea’s other nations had no such option.”

Rinh stopped walking, peering at the cityscape around her— marble domes with vines climbing up their walls, collapsed arches, stately manor homes stained by years of rainfall. “I would’ve liked to have met Louisoix,” she said.

“Well,” Y’shtola said dryly, “You’ll get to meet Matoya, at least.”

Rinh smiled brightly. “Oh! I read her monograph on analyzing the observable properties of the Aetherial Sea, and I’ve been _dying_ to ask her some questions about it.”

Y’shtola chuckled. “Good luck with that; she published that twenty years ago. Also, she’s probably just going to make you do chores for her.”

“I feel like half the people I meet have got chores for me to do.” Rinh exhaled heavily, taking another look around the intersection they’d arrived at. “Hey, Shtola, where are we now? What sort of neighborhood was this?”

“A residential section of the Collectors’ Quarter,” Y’shtola said. “Home, mostly, to citizens of means but without academic connections that required living closer to the Answering or Rulers’ Quarters— more space for grand houses than the crowded districts adjoining the, say, the Studium. There is far less residual aether here than elsewhere in the city; the people who lived here were mostly bankers, traders, and the like, rather than researchers, students, or faculty.”

“When you see aether… is it much like looking through an aetheroscope?” Rinh asked, curiosity getting the better of her.

“Not particularly; however, it still conveys similar information…” Y’shtola trailed off; something behind Rinh seemed to catch her attention. “That’s my father’s house just down the road,” she said, finally.

Rinh turned around and took in the villa of Y’rhul Nunh. It had the same austere sort of architecture that characterized most Sharlayan buildings, all whitewashed walls and marble columns, but it still put Rinh in the mind of some of the gaudier residences of the Ul’dahn elite. The high turret looming over the dome and breaking up the estate’s elegant silhouette hardly helped matters, nor did the swimming pool now filled with fetid standing water.

“We should look inside,” Y’shtola said, already walking down the road, “It’s possible some important family effects were left behind in the exodus, and it would be remiss of me to leave them here. Some of Mhitra’s things, perhaps.”

“Er… all right,” Rinh said, hurrying to follow. She was curious about what was in the mansion, and-- flimsy excuses about abandoned heirlooms aside, she suspected Y’shtola was, too.

Y’shtola climbed the stairs to the building’s portico, running her hand along the wrought-iron railing as she went. She looked up at a rather imposing front door, took a deep breath, and pulled on the handle.

The door refused to budge.

“Ah,” she said, “It’s locked.” She glanced over her shoulder, where Rinh was following just a few steps behind. “Will you do the honors, Rinh?”

Rinh cocked her head to the side, not entirely sure what was being asked of her. “As much as I enjoy the idea of breaking into some rich fellow’s house,” she said, finally, “I don’t know how to pick locks.”

Y’shtola rolled her eyes. “I was asking if you could break down the door.”

“Oh. That… that makes more sense.”

The Archon performed a pantomime of a particularly courtly sort of curtsy as she stepped out of the way, a spark of mischief lighting her eyes. “Pray lend me your strength, O Warrior of Light, and slay this foe who seeks to bar our way.”

Rinh took a few steps backwards, grateful that the portico was big enough to let her build up at least a _little_ momentum. Then she raised her shield-- a borrowed Ishgardian kite shield, hardly-used and bearing no device, rather than the buckler she’d trained with, or the Ironworks monstrosity some Crystal Brave probably nicked from the Rising Stones after her flight from Ul’dah. It was sturdy enough to suit her purposes here, though, even if it wasn’t the sort of shield that could stop, say, a javelin of light hurled by a---

She couldn’t let her thoughts go down that road, not now. She bit her lip until she could taste blood. She counted to three and charged the door.

The door was effortlessly torn off its hinges, rusty and brittle after so many years of disuse. The door tipped backwards and hit the floor with a tremendous thud. A cloud of plaster dust billowed out of the entryway.

Y’shtola smiled at Rinh before taking a dainty step over the fallen door and into the foyer.

Rinh followed, her eyes sweeping the room. The foyer was spacious, but seemed to contain little of note. The floor was covered in mosaic tiles depicting the Twelve arranged around an elemental wheel. Rhalgr and Byregot presided over Lightning at the far end of the room, so she supposed that Halone and Menphina had just been smashed to bits by the weight of the door. The remaining Ten all sported their traditional attributes, although their dress was uniformly and pointedly Sharlayan.

“Is this where you grew up?” Rinh asked; she spoke quietly, but her voice still echoed in the cavernous vestibule. “Before Matoya took you in, I mean.”

“No,” said Y’shtola, “I was only an occasional guest in these halls. My father, generally, considered his daughters to be their mothers’ problem. My mother, in turn, foisted me on Matoya the moment I was old enough to show even the most rudimentary aptitude for magic-- but she, at least, saw to it that I was provided for until then. My father had absolutely no inclination to raise children, the fact that he sired twelve of us notwithstanding.”

“Sounds a bit like my father, I guess,” Rinh said, “Or what I’ve been told of him, at least-- he was already long gone by the time I was born.”

Rinh sometimes, in her idle moments, wondered whatever became of her father. All she really had was a name-- Dhen’a Epocan-- and the knowledge that he utterly failed to live up to even the modest expectations Keeper of the Moon fathers are held to. Her sisters were all older than her, but their fathers were still regular visitors when she was growing up, bearing game, gil, and news from other parts of the forest, trading on the family’s behalf in settlements, or pitching in when it was time to move the camp or gather firewood for the winter. Her younger brother’s father-- a Seeker of the Sun who lived far, far away from the Shroud-- still managed to be a regular presence in her life. 

And when she herself was pregnant, Koh’sae doted on her. His wanderings never took him far from the Panipahrs, and he _always_ brought back something useful. Food, usually-- there was never quite enough to eat, and it was getting worse as Dalamud hung lower and lower in the sky. When she was too far along to hunt, he became a more or less permanent fixture in the camp, taking on her entire share of the hunting. He was better at it, too-- a much better shot than Rinh, although still nowhere near the master archer her mother was.

Which meant he was with everyone else when the Calamity struck. If he’d left-- or even wandered further afield-- he never would have--

She exhaled sharply. She could not-- _could not--_ let herself go where her thoughts were carrying her.

“Frankly,” Y’shtola said, “It would have better if my father had _also_ mysteriously disappeared. As it was, he would invite us to visit to celebrate our various accomplishments-- when I was made an Archon, for example. It was transparently an attempt to bask in reflected glory in hopes some of our lustre to rub off on him. A largely successful one, regrettably.”

***

The foyer set the tone for the rest of their tour of the house-- grand, spacious interiors, stripped of all furniture, moveable decorations, appliances, clothes, books, kitchenware, valuables, or indeed anything at all that might have yielded some clue as to the character of its former inhabitant. The miqo’te’s footsteps echoed up and down empty corridors. Wooden floorboards and stairs creaked from the weight of Rinh in her armor. In one room, even the mosaic flooring had been removed, pried off tile-by-tile.

“I don’t know what I expected to find,” Y’shtola said, stepping once more over the fallen door, into the cool night air of the hinterlands. “The evacuation of the colony was carefully planned far in advance and carried out in a systematic and orderly fashion. Of _course_ my father wouldn’t have left behind anything behind of import.”

“I did get to bust down some rich guy’s door, though,” Rinh said, climbing down the portico’s steps, “So that was fun, at least.” A gust of wind blew down the road-- cold enough to be invigorating without chilling. Clear, fresh air filled Rinh’s lungs-- a welcome change from the stale, dusty air of the manor house. She sat down on the steps.

“Silver linings,” Y’sthola said as she sat down beside her.

Rinh leaned back, looking up at the sky. A sea of stars greeted her-- thousands and thousands of sparkling pinpricks of light scattered across a sunless sea. “Gods,” she breathed, “Look at those stars. It’s like we’re in the middle of the countryside-- but I suppose we are, more or less. None of the city lights that blot out half the stars here, not anymore.”

“I can’t see them,” Y’shtola said, quietly, “When I behold the night sky, I see nothing but a thin skein of water- and wind-aspected aether, and above that-- an endless void. The distances between us and those foreign stars are such that no aether could bridge the gap-- or, perhaps, such stars do not have aether as we know it.”

“Oh--” Rinh stammered, abashed, “Sorry, I-- I didn’t--”

“You’ve nothing to apologize for,” Y’shtola said, craning her neck to gaze at the sky-- such as it was. “The knowledge that the stars still shine upon us is of genuine comfort.”


	5. answers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please note the change in rating; this chapter contains explicit sexual content, as foretold by the prophecy of the 'eventual smut????' tag

**Rinh**

“So Ishgard’s a republic now,” Rinh said, “Which I suppose means it’s _technically_ the best-governed polity in Eorzea.” The sky was bright and clear and cold. Ishgard loomed in the distance, shining in the harsh winter sun. The heavy overcoat she’d wrapped herself in kept the chill from being too biting; so did the mug of hot chocolate she cupped between her hands, still nearly as hot as it was when she’d prepared it back in Camp Dragonhead thanks to a couple of tiny fire-aspected crystals she’d added. It was a useful trick she’d learned during her time at the Falling Snows, although it was— and this could not be stressed enough— absolutely _imperative_ that one avoids swallowing the crystals by accident.

Another mug just like the first sat on the ground, just in front of a small stone marker. A House Fortemps shield was carefully leaned against the stone, its unicorn marred by a ragged hole. Offerings for the dead. The Panipahrs had left such offerings in the Black Shroud for generations— it was a way to remember the family dead, and a way to tell them that they were still remembered.

Rinh didn’t see any reason not to do the same for the family she’d found outside the Shroud, too.

“Admittedly,” she said, between sips of cocoa, “The bar for good governance in Eorzea is on the bloody _floor,_ so that’s not saying much. Maybe it would have been different if anyone had listened to my helpful advice about expropriating the nobility, but still— it’s _something._ The war’s over, the Ishgardian Republic has a future to look ahead to, and every piece of shite who had a hand in doing this to you is in the fucking ground.”

Rinh let a few moments of silence pass. 

She wasn’t expecting an answer, of course. Her aunt, who’d been the one to teach her all about the family ghosts and how to remember them, also gave her the grounding in modern aetherological theory to know that empirical evidence proved that souls, in death, do not linger as they do in the old stories. And even if Aunt Sizha hadn’t taught her that, she had an eyewitness account of the Lifestream to refer to. Panipahr ghosts were tied to certain places, certain selves, a link in the chain connecting past to present. Y’shtola described the Lifestream as placeless, timeless, a total negation of the objective self.

So she knew that Haurchefant lived on in some abstract way— the aether that flowed into the Lifestream as he died in her arms flowed out again into new lives, just as his mortal remains were slowly returning to the earth. It was a beautiful thought, honestly, which often brought her solace over the past year. It just wasn’t always quite what she needed. Sometimes, she needed to _talk;_ she’d just have to take it on faith that someone was listening.

But she knew no reply was forthcoming; pausing to leave space for one just felt like the polite thing to do.

“We… we’ve lost Minfilia again,” she said, softly, “For good this time, I think. I won’t bore you with all the cosmological details— I’m not here to talk your ear off about the connection between our star and its sundered shards… but I understand what Hydaelyn had asked of her, at least. One life to save one world— when put like that, it’s hardly a choice at all.”

The wind picked up, the cold sliced through Rinh’s overcoat. She took another long drink of hot chocolate, and warmth bloomed within her— but only for a moment. “I keep on thinking about these adventurers we met, though. Arbert… J’rhoomale… Blanhaerz… Naillebert… Lamimi. The ‘Warriors of Darkness’, I _guess,_ but they were champions of Hydaelyn just like us, like _me._ Yet all they got for their sacrifices was their home being swept away in a wave of Light… Losing everything like that is already too much to bear— I can’t imagine how that’s compounded by feeling responsible for it. We had to fight them— it was this whole thing with this convoluted Ascian plot, Urianger was a triple agent, the details aren’t important. But… but the look in their eyes afterwards— the resignation, the grief, the anger. The little glances they exchanged, speaking to one another without words— you could tell that they’d known each other for a long, long time, and clearly cared deeply for one another. And… and it was just so easy to imagine our positions reversed. The Warriors of Light facing— I don’t know— the Scions of the Seventh… Dusk, or something. So easy to imagine losing everything— _everything_ — in one fell swoop.”

She fell silent again, partly because she felt like she’d been talking too long, but mostly just to gather her thoughts. “So,” she says, “There’s this girl I know. Shtola… Y’shtola Rhul. I don’t think you met her? But I’m sure I’ve talked about her.”

Another pause. She thought of those first few awful days in Dragonhead. She’d felt utterly numb, just trying to push through her rage and grief— but Haurchefant had asked her to tell stories about the Scions. Eventually, she obliged— he knew, intuitively, what generations of Panipahr mothers taught their daughters: remembering is hard, but forgetting is far worse.

“And—” she began, “And I’ve… come to care for her. Care for her a great deal, in fact. But— but I don’t know what to _do_ about that. Now, please don’t misunderstand me— I’m not here to ask for permission, or anything daft like that. I remember the approximately seven-hundred times you’ve told me my happiness matters.” She raised her mug— not to drink, this time, but to feel the steam rising from it warm her face, to take in that rich, sweet aroma that always made her think of Coerthas. 

“It’s just… happiness is easier said than done. I’d be quite unhappy if my… romantic bungling wound up costing me a friendship that means the world to me. I’m not even one-hundred percent sure she likes _girls_. Although… I can take an educated guess.” A small smile; the sort she often had when talking to him. “The crux of it, though, isn’t really that sort of dithering over prosaic concerns like being as terrible at talking to girls as I am at talking to boys. It’s… it’s knowing how precarious it all is. How people like us— like those Warriors of Darkness— could lose _everything_ in an instant.”

She finally lifted her mug to her lips again, drinking the last of the hot chocolate. “And I can’t decide if that’s a reason to _not_ say anything, to avoid getting hurt, to avoid hurting _her—_ or a reason to say something _now,_ before it’s too late.” She fished the fire crystals out of the now-empty mug, wiped them off with a handkerchief, and pocketed them. “There are things I wish I’d said to you. Not _many,_ maybe— you always made it easy to bare my heart to you. And there are a _lot_ of things I wish I’d said to Koh’sae.”

Wispy clouds had begun to encroach upon that cold blue sky; a few flakes of snow were in the wind, now. “I suppose when I put it like _that,_ though, what I should do is pretty obvious, huh?”

She smiled, and leaned down to place her empty mug next to the one already placed before the gravestone; one last finishing touch to her offering. “Thanks for hearing me out,” she said, standing up, “I’ve still no bloody idea _what_ to say to her, but I should probably ask someone a little more talkative for advice on that front.”

She began her careful descent down his hill, towards the Gates of Judgment.

* * *

**Y’shtola**

Ishgard, frankly, looked pretty boring from the air. 

Its towers were dull and lusterless. Its walls and battlements were blank grey slabs. The wards outside the gates still blazed brightly, but in the city proper only a few sparks of aether lit up the gloom. A thin lattice of earth-aspected aether reinforced the lower levels, strengthening them just enough to keep the city from tipping over and tumbling into the abyss. A second layer of delicate lines corresponded to the city’s aetheryte, aethernet, and the infrastructure supporting them. Nestled high up among the Pillars, the Athenaeum Astrologicum glimmered prettily, but not consequentially.

Y’shtola had a number of theories about this. The first, and most obvious, was that aether simply didn’t travel as far as ordinary light, so it stood to reason that it looked dark and indistinct from the deck of an airship high overhead. Also relevant was the possibility that Ishgard simply didn’t have the sort of sophisticated magical public works projects the other great cities of Eorzea had— maybe it was one of the approximately six thousand things considered heretical by the old regime.

More likely: Ishgard simply was a dull place Y’shtola did not particularly like. That seemed uncharitable, though. _Rinh_ surely saw _something_ in this place, after all.

Y’shtola supposed she saw something in Ishgard, too: Rinh. Rinh was down there somewhere.

As the airship began to descend towards its mooring and the city grew nearer, it sharpened into focus. Thousands and thousands of people, the things they made, the places where they came and went— all were distinct ripples in the aether.

The airship docked. Y’shtola was one of only a few passengers. Airships plied Ishgardian skies far more frequently than they had in years past, when air travel still carried risks like being blown out of the sky by an enormous dragon, but the demand just wasn’t there. Regularly scheduled flights meant mostly-empty vessels.

Still, there were a fair few people gathered on the other side of the ticket gate. The noble passengers seemed to have entire retinues waiting for them, apparently unwilling to spend any length of time unattended. A handful of smartly dressed Maelstrom officers disembarking were greeted by their Temple Knights counterparts. A father and daughter rushed to meet another man as he passed through the gate— a family’s joyous reunion.

And there in the middle was Rinh and her son.

Rinh’a was sitting up on his mother’s shoulders, staring agape at the airship itself. Their combined height was just about equal to some of the hyur milling about; the elezen, of course, still towered over both of them.

Rinh seemed to find Y’shtola amidst the passengers queued up to disembark. Their eyes met, Rinh smiling radiantly, Y’shtola’s heart fluttering.

When she’d finally had her ticket inspected and stepped past the gate, Rinh was gently setting her son back onto the ground.

“Wow,” Rinh’a said, excitedly, “They let you get _way_ closer to the airships here than back in Limsa Lominsa! You could see the helmsman and the propellers and _everything._ ”

Rinh’a was six, now. He took after his mother in many ways— the same golden eyes, the same freckles, a miniature version of his mother’s aquiline nose. He was just a touch paler, though, his hair a very dark brown, not quite matching his mother’s raven-black locks. Clues about what Koh’sae might’ve looked like, Y’shtola thought idly.

“Oh!” Rinh’a said, as she approached the two of them, “Hi, Miss Y’shtola.” His voice was small, and he looked a little reticent, but this was still positively outgoing by Rinh’a standards. Y’shtola remembered the first time she met the boy, all that time ago in Limsa Lominsa; he’d seemed thoroughly intimidated by the prospect of meeting a stranger, barely said a word, and spent the whole conversation doing his best to hide in Rinh’s shadow.

Rinh, meanwhile, was still smiling like the cat who got the cream. “Shtola,” she said, simply, before pulling the other woman into a tight embrace.

The moment was interrupted by Rinh’a’s piping voice. “Can we stay and watch the airship take off again, Mum?”

Rinh, disengaging herself from Y’shtola’s arms, seemed to— for a moment— actually consider this. She squinted, looking past Y’shtola, who turned around and realized Rinh was literally consulting the airship timetable.

“Sorry,” she said, not unkindly, “This thing’s not leaving for another two hours. That’s a little long to be standing out here in the cold, isn’t it? _Especially_ when I’m sure your maths tutor’s waiting for you to get back. You wouldn’t want to miss out on fractions, would you?”

To Y’shtola’s surprise, the boy looked positively dismayed about the possibility of missing a lesson on fractions. He would fit right in at the Studium, she decided. 

So would his mother, she supposed, if her life had gone down a different path.

***

A steward in House Fortemps livery bowed. “Welcome home, Mistress Panipahr.”

This wasn’t Y’shtola’s first visit to Fortemps Manor, of course, but it was her first time visiting when there wasn’t some crisis or another demanding her attention— and Rinh’s.

The word _home_ jumped out at her. So did how at ease Rinh seemed in here. So did Rinh’s overcoat, as she hung it and Rinh’a’s on a coat rack— it wasn’t some borrowed Ishgardian cloak this time, but one of a decidedly Limsan cut, clearly tailor-made for Rinh. So was the way she sank down onto a sitting-room couch once she’d seen her son safely delivered to his maths lesson. Y’shtola wasn’t sure she’d ever seen Rinh quite so at peace before.

She sat down next to Rinh, as close as she dared without breaching propriety. Rinh surprised Y’shtola by sliding a little closer still, their thighs touching slightly, her hands gently brushing against Y’shtola’s.

Rinh and Y’shtola had touched one another many times. Gestures of support, of comfort, of healing or reassurance or guidance. All intensely intimate things, in their own way, but this felt different. Closeness for closeness’s sake.

“So,” murmured Rinh, “There’s something I’ve been meaning to say, Shtola. But I haven’t really known the best way to say it.”

Y’shtola raised an eyebrow curiously, and tried her best to _not_ look as if she was suddenly and unaccountably nervous. “Oh?” she said, mildly.

“So I asked around a bit and came to the following conclusion; I am absolutely horrible at talking about things like this and no amount of advice can change that. So if I just wait for the right words to come, I’ll wind up keeping my counsel indefinitely, since I’m resigned to the fact that they never will.” Rinh was fidgeting nervously, now, folding and unfolding a tiny piece of scrap paper she’d found in her pocket. 

Was she talking about what Y’shtola _thought_ she was talking about? Y’shtola dared not hope— indeed, she actively tamped down her expectations— it wouldn’t do to find herself frustrated with the Warrior of Light due to her own selfish desires.

She could feel her heart pounding in her chest.

She did her best to tune it out. Eyes forward, Y’shtola.

“Shtola,” Rinh said, “I’m _terribly_ fond of you.”

Silence, save for the ticking of a grand old clock.

“Um,” continued Rinh, “Romantically, I mean? Since obviously we’re friends and that already implies some degree of fondness by definition. And— and— and I completely get it if you want to keep it at that, so— so, just say the word and we can forget I ever said anything, since the last thing I want to do is make you feel uncomfortable. I— I want what’s best for you, whatever else I feel, so if—”

Y’shtola held Rinh’s trembling hands, leaned in, and kissed her on the lips.

“Oh,” breathed Rinh, as Y’shtola drew back.

Y’shtola smiled as confidently as she could, but she could feel the heat of a blush blooming on her cheeks. “You’ve no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that.” She kissed Rinh again, just because she could, enjoying the heady thrill of a world of possibilities that had suddenly opened up before her.

When she went in for a third kiss, though, Rinh stopped her with a finger to her lips. “Ah, we should probably continue this, um, _discussion_ somewhere that _isn’t_ Count Edmont’s parlor.”

***

Rinh’s bedroom at Fortemps Manor was, Y’shtola was fairly sure, formerly a guest room. Most of the large furniture— the plush armchairs, the sofa, the vanity, the bed— had clearly been picked out with Elezen visitors in mind, so everything was about one and a half times too big for the room’s current occupant. There was a small escritoire with a chair off in one corner, though, much less ostentatious than the Ishgardian furniture and _covered_ in letters, papers, and personal correspondence.

Indeed, the whole place was filled was filled with clutter of various sorts: books (but only on the lower shelves of the towering bookcases, with the overflow stacked on the floor), clothes, knick-knacks, mementos of past adventures, teacups, a whetstone, a hunting knife, jewelry, a small arsenal of makeup supplies, and no fewer than half a dozen swords of various shapes and sizes. Together, they painted a clear picture: this room belonged to Rinh Panipahr, Warrior of Light, no matter who it had been meant for originally.

“I’d say sorry about the mess,” Rinh said, closing the door behind her, “But I’ve seen how Matoya lives, so honestly I deserve a medal for having at _least_ two thirds of my books on actual shelves.”

Y’shtola laughed quietly, mouth hidden behind her hand. “Yet another accolade for the great Warrior of Light— slayer of primals, champion of Hydaelyn, peacemaker of the Dragonsong War, _and_ only thirty-three percent of her books are lying around on the floor.”

“Quite the catch, aren’t I?” Rinh said brightly.

“So, Rinh,” Y’shtola said, “When you suggested we adjourn here for a more private conversation, was it because you wished to discuss today’s development away from the prying eyes of Ishgardian gossips? Or was it the rather obvious euphemism I took it for?”

Rinh bit her lip. She looked this way and that. The blush she’d had since that first kiss in the parlor darkened further. “Um,” she said, finally, “Which… which would you like it to be?”

Y’shtola’s eyes swept hungrily up and down her body. As was almost always the case, the Warrior of Light was the single clearest, sharpest, brightest thing in the room. Her hair was cut short again, like she’d worn it before Ul’dah. She’d gotten a few more scars since then, too— a thin line cutting across her brow, a tiny notch taken out of her left ear. She was wearing her usual makeup— sharp eyeliner, black lipstick, the slightest hint of eyeshadow. When not out in the field, Rinh’s style of dress regularly oscillated between feminine and masculine. Today, apparently, she’d been in the mood for the latter— she was wearing a tailored black suit. Her morning coat flattered her narrow waist. The cut of her trousers was immaculate. The bottom button of her waistcoat was undone.

How, thought Y’shtola, had she _ever_ entertained the possibility that the woman standing before her was _straight?_ She felt an odd sort of giddiness, now, but she did her best to keep her features arranged into an expression of perfect confidence.

“The… the latter. If you would have me.”

Rinh grinned, fangs on full display. “Shtola… I would _love_ to have you.”

And then she got on her knees. Quickly but methodically, with clever fingers, she worked her way down Y’shtola’s boots, unbuckling straps and unbuttoning buttons.

“How do you have the patience to put these things on every day?” Rinh said, halfway down a boot, “I’ve worn _plate armor_ that’s less complicated.”

“I simply think of the time I had to wade through sewage in thin cloth leggings and my favorite pattens,” Y’shtola said.

“Wow,” Rinh deadpanned, finally reaching the last button on Y’shtola’s right boot, “You say the most romantic things.” She began peeling leather away from skin, planting kisses along each newly-bared stretch of thigh.

Y’shtola tried to think of some witty rejoinder to fire back, but she could hardly think clearly, not when she’s faced with the sight of the Warrior of Light on her knees, the feeling of soft lips pressing against her skin, the warmth she felt pooling within her.

When she’d finished with the boots, Rinh stood up again, pressing her thigh between Y’shtola’s legs. Y’shtola’s breath hitched; she ground against Rinh, seeking more friction, more sensation. Through the thin fabric of her halftights, it was just enough to be utterly tantalizing without actually _satisfying_.

Rinh tried to unfasten the ornate clasp holding Y’shtola’s coat closed, but it was a fumbling effort, and met with little success.

“Your hands are trembling,” murmured Y’shtola.

“I’m a bit nervous,” said Rinh.

“We don’t have to—”

Rinh shook her head. “It’s not like _that_. Call it… performance anxiety? I— ugh, this is embarrassing— this is the first time I’ve done anything like this with another woman? And I— I _want_ this, badly, but I’m so, so afraid of fucking it up somehow.”

Y’shtola kissed Rinh on her forehead. “You’re doing wonderfully so far.”

Rinh smiled. “I wish I could be as confident as you about this, Shtola. But I suppose you’ve had plenty of practice sweeping pretty Sharlayan girls— or boys, if you’re so inclined—”

“I’m most assuredly not,” Y’shtola cut in, laughing softly.

“—off their feet,” Rinh finished.

“Thank you for the vote of confidence,” said Y’shtola, “However, I fear I must make an embarrassing admission of my own: I haven’t ever had this sort of... intimate encounter with _anyone_ before. My affected confidence notwithstanding, we are deep in uncharted waters.”

“Well,” said Rinh, “We’ll figure it out!” She pulled back just enough to look up into Y’shtola’s eyes, carefully studying her. “What do you want? What do you think you’d like?”

Y’shtola thought this over for a moment; there were a great many things she wanted, but most of them still felt difficult to articulate. Her life was built on service to others— for Sharlayan, for the Circle of Knowing, the Scions, the people of La Noscea. Her hands could direct the elements to protect those whom the Ascians and their pawns would harm; her touch could heal those whom she was too late to protect.

This suited her, of course; it felt like a solid foundation to build oneself upon. Yet perhaps that didn’t preclude wanting things for herself.

Perhaps in here, alone with the Warrior of Light, she could afford to be a little greedy.

“You can start small,” Rinh said; apparently she’d noticed Y’shtola’s indecision.

“I think,” Y’shtola said, stroking Rinh’s cheek, “I’d like to undress you.” When Rinh nodded, her hand drifted down Rinh’s neck, and she set about untying her cravat. A moment later, it came loose.

Rinh shrugged off her morning coat, letting it fall to the ground in an undignified heap. When Y’shtola started unbuttoning Rinh’s waistcoat, she noticed Rinh staring intently at every movement of her fingers. The waistcoat fell away, revealing a white dress shirt with a high starched collar, held shut by still more tiny buttons.

“And you had the temerity to say _my_ boots were hard to take off,” Y’shtola purred.

“Look, this is Ishgard-- dressing in layers just _makes sense,_ okay?” Rinh protested, with mock-indignation. Beneath the shirt, Y’shtola discovered, was a pale chemise. At least it didn’t have yet more buttons, though; Rinh pulled it over her head and off in one fluid motion, leaving her bare from the waist up.

Y’shtola’s instinct was to avert her gaze, but she pushed away her self-consciousness; in these circumstances, she was more or less being invited to stare all she wanted. More than stare, really; Rinh was gently guiding Y’shtola’s hands onto her breasts. 

Y’shtola took this as a cue to be a little bolder exploring the other woman’s body, caressing soft skin, tracing the lines of old scars, brushing across stretch marks; when her fingers grazed across a stiffened nipple, Rinh exhaled so sharply Y’shtola’s bangs were blown out of place. She responded with a lingering kiss, her hands never leaving Rinh’s body.

When Y’shtola finally pulled away, Rinh sounded more than a little breathless. “Off— off to a good start, I’d say.”

So, Y’shtola thought, she responds positively to a certain degree of decisiveness. She decided to summon up some semblance of her earlier confidence, but as a knowing act of artifice this time, a role deliberately stepped into with a wink and a nod, rather than an affected façade over her insecurities. “You looked quite fetching when you were on your knees,” she said, taking a step back towards the bed. Without further instruction, Rinh was on her knees again, looking up at her with eager, hungry eyes.

It was _electrifying._

“N-now,” Y’shtola said, trying her best to sound commanding despite the obvious quaver in her voice, “I— I want you to go down on me.” Rinh’s hands glided up Y’shtola’s legs, pausing briefly to admire the slight indentation still visible where the lip of her boots had squeezed her thighs, before making their way to her hips. Rinh hooked her thumbs into the waistband of Y’shtola’s halftights and smallclothes and slid them down.

Y’shtola sat down on the very edge of the bed. Rinh gently eased her legs apart. She looked up at Y’shtola one more time; after a single nod from the conjurer, she set about her task with the ardor and thoroughness expected of the Warrior of Light.

Rinh started slow— not exactly _hesitant_ , but perhaps a bit tentative. Her fingers ghosted across Y’shtola’s folds. Her tongue glanced across Y’shtola’s clit, feather-light. Even these small touches were enough for Y’shtola’s breathing to become ragged, enough to leave her slick with want. Nobody had ever touched her like this before. Part of her could still barely believe any of this was real. Another part of her was rapidly forgetting that anything _besides_ this was real. The world, in all its complexity and glory, for all its beauties and terrors, had shrunk down to herself, her lover, and this bed.

When Rinh finally provoked Y’shtola to cry out, she assumed a steadier rhythm. She licked and sucked her clit fervently— _relentlessly_. Rinh’s tongue and lips were soon joined by two fingers sliding into her, building up to fucking her at the same pace.

 _“Fuck,”_ Y’shtola breathed, “Keep going, keep going—” She realized she was being quite noisy. Nosier than she ever expected she’d be. By this point, though, she really didn’t care. She barely cared about anything, now— all that mattered now was pure physical sensation, bright and overpowering as the Warrior of Light’s shining aether. “Keep going!” she repeated, “Keep going, keep going, keep going keep going keepgoingkeepgoingkeep—”

She threw her head back as she came, the noises she made no longer even slightly resembling words, carrying no meaning beyond pure, exultant, sensual pleasure. Rinh didn’t stop; instead, she gradually slowed her pace, helping Y’shtola ride out the cresting waves.

When she finally came back to herself, she’d flopped backwards onto the bed, fingers and toes still tingling, panting and spent. Rinh hopped up onto the bed, sitting beside Y’shtola’s prone form. She looked down at her with something like the air of a craftswoman admiring her handwork, running her hand through Y’shtola’s pale hair.

“So,” Rinh said, more than a little breathlessly, “That what you had in mind?”

“One could say that,” Y’shtola murmured.

Rinh took a handkerchief out of her trousers pocket and dabbed at her mouth and chin. It was a gesture so incongruously dainty Y’shtola had to laugh.

The fact Rinh was still wearing trousers at all, though, reminded Y’shtola that this was still a deed only half-done. “Off with those,” she said. Her affected imperiousness felt even more ridiculous now, her face flushed, her hair and remaining clothes in disarray, her arms and legs trembling as she pushed herself back into sitting upright. Rinh seemed more than happy to indulge her, though, standing up and slithering out of her trousers. Y’shtola took the opportunity to finally finish unfastening the clasp on her coat Rinh had only gotten half-open before getting distracted, unbuttoning what she couldn’t help but pointedly think of as a perfectly reasonable number of buttons, and slipping out of her coat.

“Gods,” Rinh murmured, rejoining Y’shtola on the bed, “You’re beautiful.” Y’shtola ran her hand down Rinh’s side, appreciating how different Rinh’s body was from her own, how well they complemented one another, sitting side-by-side like this. Y’shtola’s body was all supple skin and soft curves; the Warrior of Light, on the other hand, had her share of sharp angles and hard edges. Between her size and how much power she drew from her seemingly bottomless reserves of aether, it was easy to forget just how physically strong she was beneath all that armor. Her slight silhouette hid lean, wiry muscle. Those delicately-proportioned hands were calloused from years of swinging a sword. She was covered in scars, but still standing, still pressing forward.

Y’shtola’s hand slid further down, dipping between Rinh’s legs; when it reached her smallclothes— soaking by this point— even the slightest friction against her was enough for her to roll her hips frantically, looking for any sort of purchase. When Y’shtola lightened her touch just the slightest bit, Rinh actually whined, impatiently.

“Eager, aren’t we?” Y’shtola said, amused.

“Guh— guilty as charged,” Rinh stammered, between gasping breaths, “Shtola, please— _fuck me_ already. With your fingers, with your mouth, with— with anything, I don’t care. Just— just fuck me, Shtola— please. _Please.”_

Y’shtola decided she quite liked the sight of the Warrior of Light begging for her, but filed this information away for future reference— for now, she had no intention of ignoring so earnest an entreaty. She pulled her smallclothes down, just enough to get them out of the way and give Rinh what she so desperately wanted. Her fingers easily slid into Rinh, wet as she was, while her thumb slipped and slid over Rinh’s clit.

Every tiny movement Y’shtola made was enough to make Rinh writhe, twisting her whole body this way and that in time with her fingers. Rinh was murmuring something under her breath with the fervency of a prayer. She’d lapsed into Huntspeak, Y’shtola realized. It was a language Y’shtola had never learned— neither traditional tribal life in general nor hunting in particular had featured prominently in her upbringing— but it was still instantly recognizable, a chain of hisses and whistles and tongue-clicks and phonemes only miqo’te could pronounce.

 _“Shtola,”_ she gasped as she came, clenching around Y’shtola’s fingers, stressing the _h_ in a way she never did when speaking the common language, _“Sh-h-h-htola—”_

When Rinh finally came down, they more or less collapsed into one another’s arms, falling onto the bed together, a limp tangle of sweaty limbs and twisted bedsheets and swishing tails.

Y’shtola lay like that for a while, listening to Rinh catching her breath, watching her chest rising and falling.

“Well,” Rinh said brightly, “I think our discussion went pretty well!”


	6. the stately quadrille

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> content warning: like the last chapter, this one contains explicit sexual content. it also, separately, contains allusions to past trauma and abuse.

**Y’shtola**

It was a period of unusual calm in Eorzea. The crisis in Ishgard was well and truly over, while the dark clouds gathering over Ala Mhigo had yet to break into a storm.

Rinh and Y’shtola were still both extremely busy, of course— even with the realm at peace, the services of two of the most experienced and well-known of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn were ever in demand. Y’shtola spent hours poring over the Athenaeum’s astrological observations and records, tracing the movements of stars she’d never again see for herself, but rendered in exquisite detail as long columns of figures and mathematical formulas compiled by the astrologians, looking for any sign that the danger once posed by Nidhogg’s rage still lingered amongst the remnants of his brood. Rinh, for her part, spent much of her time with her son, trying to be around for him as long as she could before the next realm-threatening danger once more tore her away for months and months. She also, for some reason, had been called upon to deliver a speech at the House of Commons— about what, Y’shtola could scarcely guess. And some of the time they _did_ spend together was still swallowed up by Scion business— chiefly going over communications intercepts from the Garlean military, since apparently the entire Eorzean intelligence apparatus ran through Tataru Taru’s table at the Forgotten Knight.

Still, compared to how things were even a few weeks ago, the pace of daily life felt positively languid. Nighttime was especially open-ended; a perfect opportunity to explore this new space that had opened up before them, to learn one another’s bodies, to draw a map of themselves, their landmarks, their boundaries.

Y’shtola learned that Rinh enjoyed being guided by a firm hand, but never a rough one; she liked to be held—and even, on occasion, held _down,_ but never grabbed. Y’shtola got more and more comfortable taking control (and Rinh more than happy to cede it), but always as a role knowingly adopted, a game she played with Rinh, a pretense to take care of a woman who so readily accepted others’ burdens as her own.

Y’shtola learned all about Rinh’s scars. Most of them were from her gladiator days; many of these she barely even remembered getting. “It all just… runs together when I try to remember it,” she’d murmured, once, as Y’shtola planted a line of delicate kisses along the contour of an old, imperfectly healed slash cut into her thigh, “When your job is to stand there and get hit with a sword, a new scar was just— just part of the routine.”

Some of the scars did have stories behind them, though. “A Wood Wailer gave me this when I was sixteen,” she said, when Y’shtola delicately ran her fingers across a jagged scar on her shoulder blade, sounding almost proud of the fact. The long scar across the bridge of her nose was a token of her first appearance on the bloodsands— the only blow her opponent landed that day. The small mark at the base of her thumb was the result of the knife slipping while she was cutting some medicinal herbs for Aunt Sizha. The notch taken out of one ear happened during the rescue of Raubahn Aldynn from Ilberd’s Crystal Braves— one gladiator pulling another from the depths of Halatali— while Y’shtola was still lost in the Lifestream.

Y’shtola learned about scars less visible than the ones criss-crossing the Warrior of Light’s skin, too. Scars seen instead in the way she tensed up whenever someone behind her back touched her, or her request that Y’shtola never held her hands by the wrists, or her refusal to drink anything poured by someone other than herself— not even Y’shtola.

Y’shtola, too, was marked by the hardships she’d suffered, loath though she was to admit it. Even after Thancred had been found, after the mystery of Minfilia’s summons from Hydaelyn had been unraveled, after welcoming Yda and Papalymo back into the Rising Stones after months spent skirmishing along the Gyr Abanian border, that one terrible night in Ul’dah still weighed heavily on her. Her ability to see aether was a wonder much of the time, but sometimes she’d wake up in the middle of the night and panic when the only thing she could see was aether swirling all around her, as if she was still helpless and drowning in the Lifestream. Sometimes, she felt herself still buried under the rubble in a Sil’dihn sewer, like she had been for a brief, terrible moment between the tunnel collapsing and Flow swiftly carrying her away.

But now Rinh was there to reel her back when she was caught in the past’s riptide, holding her tightly, murmuring reassurances softly in her ear.

Neither of them have had particularly easy lives. But, like all burdens, the past was easier to carry with help than alone.

***

Y’shtola almost always woke up before Rinh did. Rinh was generally a light sleeper, easily roused, but part of her still rebelled against the idea of living her life on the sun’s schedule. Still a Keeper of the Moon at heart, thought Y’shtola, even after so long away from the place that made her. She came to enjoy waking up to the sight of Rinh sprawled across the bed, sleeping peacefully, sunlight tracing delicate patterns on her bare skin, aether gently pulsing in time with the rising and falling of her chest. A fine way to start one’s day.

Even if Rinh _did_ have a certain tendency to steal all the blankets.

When Y’shtola woke up today, though, she was alone in bed. This wasn’t exactly _surprising—_ and certainly not cause for concern; if she actually had to be somewhere, Rinh was punctual to a fault. Still, those lazy mornings were a small luxury Y’shtola missed on days like this.

Odd, she thought, how in just a few weeks she’d gotten so used to sleeping with another by her side. She’d spent so much of her life alone; even after she’d found family among the Circle of Knowing and the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, her duties often left her on her own, with Thancred in Ul’dah, Papalymo and Yda in Gridania, and Urianger staying behind at the Waking Sands. She had a great many trusted, reliable allies in Limsa Lominsa, but few _friends._

***

As Y’shtola climbed down the stairs, she could hear snatches of conversation coming from the dining room.

“You are, of course, under no obligation to attend— or even to represent our House if you do attend,” said a man’s voice Y’shtola recognized as Count Edmont de Fortemps, “If Artoirel suggested otherwise, then he forgets himself and I shall have to speak to him anon.”

The familiar lilt of Rinh’s voice answered. “Artoirel’s… trying. I _guess._ I don’t think he tried to be patronizing on _purpose,_ but— well. It _was_ rather patronizing of him to suggest I was _especially_ suitable because the Speaker of the House of Commons would be favorably disposed towards ‘a fellow commoner’.”

Y’shtola stepped into the dining room, where a conversation over breakfast was already well underway. Rinh and Edmont seemed to be discussing some sort of thorny political issue, while Rinh’a’s eyes ping-ponged from one to the other as they each spoke in turn.

“Morning, Shtola,” Rinh said, a bit sleepily in spite of the large mug of coffee she’d been nursing. Y’shtola sat down next to her and poured herself a cup of tea.

“That _said,”_ Rinh continued, “I _do_ want to go. Getting dressed up for a fancy ball sounds fun. I quite like dancing, actually, but it’s not often I get a chance to do it.”

“I didn’t know that,” Y’shtola said, mildly.

“Yeah, I learned how to dance properly back in Ul’dah,” said Rinh.

Y’shtola took a sip of her tea. “I suppose there _is_ a lot of common ground between dancing and fighting.”

Rinh shook her head. “Not… really? I mean, I told my lanista something like that to justify the expense of engaging a dance instructor, but the reason I took lessons was because I wanted to do _something_ that didn’t all come back around to the Coliseum in the end. A little bit of Rinh Panipahr he couldn’t have.”

Y’shtola set down her teacup and silently laid her hand on Rinh’s. She didn’t know the full history of Rinh’s time with Eadwulf, the man who trained her as gladiator in the years before she caught the guildmaster’s eye, and she supposed she never would, unless one day Rinh chose to share it of her own accord. Y’shtola didn’t need to know the details to recognize the subject was painful to her as few others were.

Edmont, gallantly, pretended not to notice this clear breach of dining etiquette.

“Anyroad!” Rinh said, brightening a little, “How would you feel about showing up at a ball with the Warrior of Light on your arm?”

“Of course,” Y’shtola answered without a moment’s hesitation.

Rinh beamed at her with adoration.

Edmont gave Y’shtola an appraising look. “Are you familiar with Ishgardian dance-steps and ballroom etiquette, Mistress Y’shtola? If not, I’m sure one of my sons would be happy to instruct—”

“That won’t be necessary,” said Y’shtola, who had never been to a ball in her entire life.

***

Aether hummed. Light shined, reflected in crystal.

There was an audible _pop_ as a Y’shtola Rhul-sized volume of air was suddenly displaced.

The aetheryte dimmed, and Y’shtola stepped onto the cobbled streets of Revenant’s Toll.

***

“Y’shtola?” asked Thancred, “What are you _doing_ here?”

“I told you on the pearl,” Y’shtola said, shutting the door behind her, “I wished for your counsel regarding a sensitive matter.”

“Well, yes,” said Thancred, “but I wasn’t aware that by that, you meant ‘I’m teleporting halfway across the continent, see you at the Rising Stones in a quarter-bell.’ Just how urgent _is_ this?”

“Extremely,” Y’shtola said, “This needs to be resolved by nightfall.”

“Well…? Out with it.”

“The Warrior of Light,” said Y’shtola, expression grave, “has asked me to accompany her to a ball.”

Thancred sighed heavily. _“Really_ , Y’shtola? Well, congratulations on getting another crack at asking Rinh to dance with you, what, a full year and a half after I suggested you give it a try? Now, goodbye and have a nice trip back to Ishgard.”

“Ah,” said Y’shtola, “I fear I’ve buried the lede. The Warrior of Light has asked me to accompany her to a ball because, some weeks prior, we became— as the Ishgardians say— _paramours._ ”

Thancred was dumbstruck for a few long moments. “...huh,” he said, finally, “Alright. Congratulations…? I’m not sure what you need _my_ advice for, then— it sounds like everything sorted itself out nicely for you.”

Y’shtola folded her arms. She looked around the Rising Stones; it was, thankfully deserted save for the two of them. “When I accepted Rinh’s invitation, I… I may have _very slightly_ exaggerated my familiarity with such events. So...” She took a deep breath. Time to face the music, Y’shtola. “I need you to teach me to dance.”

Thancred, to his credit, didn’t start laughing, but Y’shtola could tell from the way the corners of his mouth twitched that it was a near thing. “Fine,” he said, “In recognition of the fact that you’ve _finally_ tumbled the Warrior of Light after pining away for Twelve know how long, I’ll do you this favor.”

Y’shtola scowled. “That’s a rather crude way of putting it.”

Thancred’s grin was somehow even more wolfish now that months in the Dravanian wilderness had left him decidedly scruffy-looking. “...Am I _wrong,_ though?”

“No,” admitted Y’shtola.

“Now then!” Thancred said breezily, sauntering towards the countertop at the back of the Stones’ main room, “Being able to move through high society is part and parcel of an espionage Archonate, and that includes _reams_ of ballroom etiquette for nations great and small across the Three Continents.” He hopped over the bar and began rummaging around behind it for something. Y’shtola caught herself hoping it was a stiff drink, so she was slightly disappointed when Thancred set an old orchestrion and a pile of music rolls onto the countertop. He vaulted back over the bar. “Considering the time constraint you’re under, though, we’d best condense that curriculum down to the most popular dance among the Ishgardian elite.” He picked up one of the rolls and blew a thin layer of dust off of it. “The waltz.”

The music the orchestrion began to play sounded tinny and scratchy— this was clearly an old recording, made when the technology was still in its infancy, rather than the higher fidelity audio afforded in recent years by Garlond Ironworks’ adaption of magitek recording and storage media. It sounded rather like a string ensemble had been submerged in molasses, yet still valiantly played on.

Thancred began tapping his foot in time with the music. “You must’ve studied at least _some_ music theory before you picked your focus at the Studium, right?”

“A bit,” said Y’shtola. The Sharlayan musical tradition was nearly as dry as Sharlayan art, architecture, and cuisine. It was regarded— and taught— as a more or less abstract combination of mathematics and acoustics. The very best Sharlayan composers’ pieces had a beautiful complexity to them— dozens of interwoven parts, performed with perfect precision, layered into a nearly fractal soundscape. _Most_ Sharlayan composers tried and failed to achieve this effect, though, creating something like a musical Archon Loaf— dense, bland, and unpalatable.

“So,” Thancred said, “Waltzes are in 3/3 time, so the first thing you need to learn is counting out the beats, since all the steps flow from that. Count— _one_ two three, _one_ two three, _one_ two three…”

Y’shtola joined him. “One two three, one two three…” She felt rather foolish, but she _did_ manage to keep to the music’s tempo.

“Now,” said Thancred, apparently pleased with his pupil’s performance, “Let’s go over the actual steps.” He carefully took hold of Y’shtola’s hand, so conspicuously cautious that she couldn’t help but feel a little miffed— did he think she’d snatch her hand away? Crush him with a giant boulder? When she did neither of those things, though, he put his other hand on her waist.

“To start with,” he said, “Just follow my lead.”

On their first turn around the room, Y’shtola stepped on Thancred’s toes no fewer than six times.

On their second, she only did it twice.

The third time around, Thancred deemed her steps “adequate enough.”

Just after they started the fourth, the door to tbe Rising Stones opened, and Krile stepped through.

She stared at at Thancred and Y’shtola.

Thancred and Y’shtola stared at her.

“I’m not even going to ask,” she said.

***

Twenty minutes later, Y’shtola was back in Ishgard, climbing up the spiraling stone stairway connecting the aetheryte plaza to the Pillars. She felt a bit light-headed; maybe making two aetheryte jumps in the space of three bells was a bit more taxing on her aether reserves than she’d assumed— or hoped. Maybe she’d forgotten to account for the small but constant drain of her aethersight? She still felt slightly rattled by Matoya’s warning about the toll it was taking on her, although she’d taken pains to conceal it.

Oh well. She’d made it up the stairs without fainting, and was free to just lounge around Fortemps Manor and rest until the hour of the ball was at hand. She could run the numbers later.

***

Rinh and Y’shtola, arm-in-arm, stepped into the foyer of a large townhouse in the southeastern Pillars— the residence of the Right Honorable Alexois Eugeoiret, Speaker of the Ishgardian Republic’s House of Commons. The moment they were past the threshold, attendants hurried over to take their coats.

Rinh was wearing the same red dress she’d worn that fateful night in Ul’dah.

Perhaps she should be bothered by that, Y’shtola thought. It didn’t, though— in fact, she appreciated the chance to admire it in a new context. The fact that this time it wasn’t one of the worst days of Y’shtola’s life helped. So did details of the dress she hadn’t been able to see before— the aspected threads and fabrics the dressmaker had used made the whole dress seem to shimmer slightly, lightly dusted with aether.

But mostly it was just how comely the Warrior of Light looked in it— the way the dress clung to her curves, the extraordinarily daring slit up its side, the tantalizing glimpse of cleavage offered by its cut.

And this time she wasn’t an object of distant infatuation— Y’shtola knew exactly what was under that dress, now. She was Y’shtola’s, and Y’shtola was hers.

Y’shtola’s own attire was rather more conservative— unlike Rinh, tonight would form the Ishgardian gentry’s first impression of her. She didn’t much care what they thought of her _per se_ , but she felt that whatever she did would wind up reflecting on Rinh, too. She was wearing the sort of long, white gown that had been fashionable in Sharlayan seven or eight years ago— the last time she’d visited the Sharlayan motherland, and also the last time she’d needed any sort of formalwear. In true Sharlayan fashion, it was cut from a single large, precisely measured rectangle of fine cloth, artfully draped and folded and pleated and cinched until it looked almost architectural— the sort of thing an ancient caryatid might wear.

Y’shtola didn’t particularly like this dress— it made her feel like she was a fluted column holding up some stately edifice of learning— but it was either this, or borrow an Ishgardian gown sized for a Midlander woman and hope for the best.

They were ushered into the main hall, and Y’shtola immediately noticed something was amiss— the music was very obviously _not_ in 3/3 time. Her sinking feeling was confirmed as she looked around the ballroom and took in the other guests—a mixture of nobles and their functionaries and the well-to-do commoner gentry. Their dance steps didn’t even _slightly_ resemble what Thancred had shown her. Instead it was a sort of group dance where couples would turn around one another with small, dainty steps, arms extended and hands just barely touching, before twirling away and switching partners according to some complicated schema she couldn’t quite follow.

The next time she was in Revenant’s Toll, she was going to _kill_ Thancred.

“Oh! They’re dancing a quadrille!” Rinh said, gently tugging Y’shtola towards the dance floor. A confession that she’s in way over her head was on the tip of her tongue—

—and then Rinh doubled over, clutching at Y’shtola’s arm, one hand pressed to her temple. A small, strangled gasp of pain escaped her throat, her grip grew slack, and she fell to the ground—

—and suddenly whether or not Y’shtola knew her dance steps was the least important thing in the world.

* * *

**Rinh**

_A cavernous hall, richly ornamented._

_The band’s playing dance music as a crowd of indistinct figures sways back and forth._

_Your friends are here, your family, faces you've missed dearly, presences long absent. You've come home after a long journey._

_The band begins to play your favorite tune._

_“Listen,” you say, taking your lover’s hand, “That’s our song.”_

_The two of you glide out onto the dance floor. You missed this. You missed this. You missed this._

_These sounds, these feelings, these lofty thoughts._

_Hear. Feel. Think._

***

When Rinh came to, she was crying.

She was laid out on a chaise longue, in what she supposed must be Speaker Eugeoiret’s drawing room. Y’shtola was there, though, and surely that meant she was safe, that everything was going to be alright.

“Was that the Echo?” Y’shtola asked softly, running her hand through Rinh’s hair.

Rinh sniffled. “Y-yes. But… but it’s been a long time since it’s kicked my arse like that.”

“What did you see?”

“I saw…” Rinh’s head swam, and she felt a wave of nausea. “I’m not sure what I saw. It’s like… I can’t quite parse what I was seeing; when I try to remember the details they just slip away… or maybe it’s bits of _me_ that are slipping away?” She tried, experimentally, to sit up again, but dizziness forced her back down to a reclining position. “It… it was someone arriving at another ball? Or I think it was a ball— there was dancing, and music in a style I couldn’t recognize. She… she was coming back after a long time spent somewhere else, seeing the people she cares about for the first time in ages. But it wasn’t crisp and _focused_ the way the Echo usually is.”

“How are you feeling now?” Y’shtola asked, “Are you in any pain?”

“A bit light-headed…” Rinh said, “The headache went away as soon as I came out of it— that much is the same as it usually is, at least. But it still… it still took something out of me; I feel exhausted… exhausted and sad. The feeling I get when I think about the Shroud, about Mum and Auntie and my sisters…”

Y’shtola kneeled alongside the chaise and held Rinh’s hand. Rinh felt a little more present than she had before, a little less unmoored from when and where she was.

She took a deep breath. “Shtola,” she said, “We should go home… I want to be home, again.” She smiled sheepishly. “I know we just got here, but…”

“It’s all right,” Y’shtola said, gently planting a kiss on Rinh’s forehead, “I didn’t actually know how to dance the quadrille, anyway.”

***

By the time they got back to Rinh’s bedchamber, Rinh was already in better spirits. The memory of what she’d seen receded further and further into the distance, taking the weight of the deep melancholy that had settled over her with it. She was safe, in a place that was hers, with the woman she loved.

A fire was burning merrily in the hearth, driving away the last of her chills from the long walk through snowy streets from the Speaker’s townhouse.

“I’m a bit embarrassed about what happened tonight,” Rinh said, standing by the fireplace, warming her hands.

Y’shtola smiled reassuringly. “You have no cause to be; you can hardly be held responsible if Hydaelyn chooses to speak at an inconvenient moment.”

Rinh sighed. “I know, I know. It’s still bloody embarrassing, though— just walking in the door and _immediately_ eating shit.”

Y’shtola turned to look at Rinh. “I’d like to think that _ended a thousand-year war_ thoroughly overshadows _fainted at a party once.”_ The sight of Y’shtola was utterly entrancing. Her features were lit by the dancing flames in the hearth; her bronze skin practically glowed, alive with light. Rinh wondered if that was how she looked to Y’shtola, dusted with shining aether.

For all that Rinh had lost in her life— far more than anyone should, more than anyone would have in a kinder world— for all that the Echo burdened her with larger and far older sorrows, for all that she was caught in grief’s long shadow— right now, right here, Y’shtola was with her. The desolate loneliness she’d felt after emerging from her vision of that strange ball, separated from those she loved by a yawning chasm? It was just a shadow of a fragment of somebody else’s memory, in another place, another time.

Even those she _had_ lost were never far away; the Panipahrs kept their ghosts close, always.

And Y’shtola was even closer.

She wanted Y’shtola’s hands on her body, she decided— she wanted that sort of closeness, that sort of intimacy.

“It’s still rather an anticlimactic end to the evening, isn’t it?” Rinh murmured, “Although… I suppose that doesn’t _have_ to be the end.”

“Whatever could you mean?” Y’shtola asked, mischief in her eyes, “Shall I break out the Triple Triad deck? A round of charades, perhaps?”

Rinh laughed. “Don’t make me beg, Shtola…”

“I like it when you beg, though.”

Rinh could feel her cheeks burning. “ _Fuck_ me already, Shtola.”

Y’shtola leaned in, but all she did was lightly kiss Rinh’s cheek. “You can do better than _that,_ surely?”

 _“Please,”_ Rinh breathed, “Fuck me. Fuck me any way you want to, just— I just— I want to _feel_ you.”

“That’s more like it,” Y’shtola purred, rewarding Rinh with a more lingering kiss on the lips.

She pushed Rinh towards the bed— lightly at first, a suggestion rather than a command; when Rinh yielded readily and eagerly, though, Y’shtola was more forceful.

Rinh knew could have kept standing there motionless; Y’shtola was lithe and athletic, but as a paladin Rinh was well-studied in the art and science of being an immovable object. She let herself get pushed onto the bed anyway, though; she liked the idea of trusting someone enough to tame her strength.

“Feeling a bit frisky, huh?” Rinh said, as Y’shtola straddled her, as Y’shtola’s hands caressed the bare skin exposed by the slit in her dress.

“From the _moment_ I saw you still had that dress,” Y’shtola said, “I’ve wanted to fuck you in it.” Her hands touched Rinh more insistently, now, moving up her thighs until she reached their apex. She ran a finger along Rinh’s silk pantalettes. “My, but _these_ are fancy, too.”

“Yes, well, I—” Rinh began, but her breath hitched when Y’shtola applied just a _touch_ more pressure. “I— I had a feeling things might go like this. B-but maybe later in the evening than this…” She could already feel a heat building up inside her, and her lover had barely even started to _tease_ her. When she tried to rock her hips against the heel of Y’shtola’s hand, though, Y’shtola pulled back.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, dearest,” Y’shtola chided gently. She nipped softly at Rinh’s neck, pushing her dress’s collar aside and leaving a faint love-bite. “You’re mine. Let me take care of you.”

Rinh grinned a fangy smile. “Assertiveness looks good on you, Shtola,” she quipped— but she _did_ make an effort to stop squirming.

“Good girl,” Y’shtola cooed, stroking a velvety ear. Rinh couldn’t help but sigh contentedly; in most circumstances, she disliked having her ears touched, but other miqo’te always knew how to do it _just so;_ she’d forgotten that in the years since she’d lost Koh’sae. Y’shtola’s other hand, meanwhile, found its way back between Rinh’s legs and under her dampened pantalettes, rewarding her with a more sustained touch than before, eliciting a series of a rather different sort of sighs.

When those sighs became breathy moans, though, Y’shtola pulled back again. _“Fuck,_ Shtola,” Rinh murmured— but when the other woman slid off the bed and stood up, her frustration was shot through with a thrill of anticipation.

Y’shtola had something of the air of an antique priestess performing a ritual, although Rinh wasn’t sure if that was because of her rather archaic-looking Sharlayan finery, or just the general quiet dignity with which she almost always conducted herself with, even here, even now. She unbuckled the belt cinching her dress’s high waist and unfastened the clasps at her shoulders; the whole dress, with all of its artful drapery and architectural pleats fell away— by the time it hit the floor, it just looked like a heap of undifferentiated fabric.

Rinh, meanwhile, was trying to wriggle out of her smallclothes with whatever the exact opposite of quiet dignity was.

Shed of her vestments, Y’shtola leaned down and retrieved an ornate box from underneath the bed. It looked like the sort of thing one would store something both precious and fragile in— a set of hand-carved chessmen, perhaps, or an expensive pair of field glasses, or some sort of delicate instrument.

She unlatched the box. The toy was a _sort_ of a delicate instrument, Rinh supposed, although she was pretty sure it was made out of some sort of recently-formulated durable polymer, quite at odds with its faux-antique container. When they’d first bought it from an especially furtive merchant at the Jeweled Crozier (a “ _godemiché”,_ she’d called it, even though it was fairly obviously just a dildo in a fancy box), the whole thing struck Rinh as a pretty decent metaphor for the Ishgardian attitude towards sexuality.

Now, of course, watching Y’shtola carefully securing the toy in its harness, strapping it on, and rubbing lubricating oil along its length, the sociology of it all was absolutely the last thing on her mind.

When she clambered back onto the bed, Y’shtola— as she frequently did— started off cautiously, gently pushing the toy’s tip into Rinh, carefully studying Rinh’s reaction. It was only when Rinh thrust her hips up to meet it that Y’shtola moved more decisively to sink the toy’s curved length further in.

The next thrust was quicker, the next quicker still, each time sending a new jolt of pleasure through Rinh. Before long, Y’shtola had worked up to a vigorous tempo, with Rinh’s shuddering gasps keeping perfect time.

“ _Shtola_ ,” Rinh breathed, lapsing into the hisses and trilling of Huntspeak, “Don’t— hh— don’t stop, don’t you _dare_ stop—”

Rinh’s hand dipped between her legs, and she ghosted her fingers over her clit, the contrast between the finesse of these light touches with the blunt, overpowering thrusts of the toy sharpening both sensations into something overwhelming, something that left her seeing stars. She was vaguely aware of the sound of fabric ripping, but she really didn’t care about the state of her dress anymore; that was a problem for Future Rinh. Nothing mattered but right here, right now— not fears for the future, not the burdens of the past.

She was at the edge— she was at the _very_ edge— but she almost didn’t want to let this moment end; she was fast approaching a summit but still reluctant to begin her descent.

Y’shtola’s husky voice cut in. “Come for me,” she said, willing as ever to offer her lover direction.

Permission duly granted, Rinh let herself let go.

And Y’shtola kept up the pace until the last of the aftershocks faded, not letting up until she was satisfied that Rinh was left completely sated.

For a few moments, Rinh just laid there, listening to her own ragged panting as she caught her breath and the rustle of leather and metal as Y’shtola struggled to get the harness off again. The bed was a mess. So was Rinh’s dress. So was Rinh herself, really.

The older woman was the first to speak. “How do you feel?” she murmured, the iron in her voice vanishing immediately.

“Like if I tried to stand up, I’d immediately fall over,” Rinh said, an exhausted grin on her face, “But, you know, in a good way.”

Y’shtola laughed softly. “I can always tell you’re _really_ enjoying yourself when you start murmuring things in Huntspeak. Which I still don’t speak a word of, by the by, but given the context clues I think I got the gist of it.”

“Anyroad,” said Rinh, “I suppose it’s my turn to take care of you, now.”

“We can worry about that presently. For now, I shall simply bask in the satisfaction of a job well done.”

There was a soft knocking at the door.

“Go away,” Rinh said, weakly.

“The lady is indisposed,” Y’shtola added, when the knocking continued unabated.

“Mistress Panipahr?” said the muffled voice on the other side of the door, “There’s a message for you. I’m afraid it’s quite urgent.”

“Can’t he just slide it under the door or something?” Rinh muttered, but Y’shtola was already standing up and wrapping herself in a dressing gown. As an afterthought, she tossed the bed sheet over Rinh, since there was absolutely no way to make her presentable on such short notice, and sauntered casually to the door. Rinh heard her exchange a few quiet words with the steward, the door shutting, and an envelope being torn open. 

When Rinh finally poked her head out from beneath the sheets, Y’shtola’s expression was grim. Wordlessly, she handed over a slip of paper.

With trembling hands, Rinh read it.

_Garlean forces are massing at Baelsar’s Wall. Reports of sporadic fire between imperial pickets and unknown third party— Griffin’s scouts, maybe? Need you back at the Stones as soon as you can manage._

_Thancred_

Her stomach sank. A storm was coming.


	7. the bloodsands (reprise)

**Rinh**

A cold, dead weight settled in the pit of Rinh’s stomach when she saw the column of black smoke rising from Rhalgr’s Reach, when she heard the thunderous peal of artillery fire echoing across the Fringes, when she smelled the unmistakable scent of burning ceruleum.

Her dread deepened when, as she approached the Reach with Pipin and Alphinaud, she started seeing bedraggled survivors coming from the other direction: the shell-shocked with their thousand-yalm-stares, the walking wounded leaning on one another, the vanquished. 

When she saw Krile and Arenvald shepherding a party of Resistance soldiers, including an officer as senior as M’naago, defeat in their eyes, Rinh began to worry that she was about to fling herself into not a battle, but a rout.

And yet the scene of carnage that greeted her once she finally got to the Reach  _ still _ stopped her in her tracks.

The artillery fire had mostly ceased, replaced by the sharp cracks of small arms and the clamor of metal hitting metal. The air was filled with enough smoke— gunpowder, exhaust, and sporadically burning fires— to make Rinh’s eyes water. A couple of Garlean troop transports were dark silhouettes against the slate-grey sky; an ominous sight, but not half so ominous as the silence of the Resistance’s anti-aircraft guns.

The ground was littered with the dead— some in imperial black and red, some in the ornate armor of the Skulls, but most— by far— in khaki resistance uniforms or brightly-colored Alliance greatcoats.

Rinh took a deep breath. No way forward but through, as always. Nothing to do but put one foot in from of the other, over and over again, until she no longer felt the flames at her back.

She squared her posture. She raised her shield, the crimson arms of House Fortemps brilliant even amidst the smoke.

And she charged.

She cut through the imperial lines, swatting away conscripts and centurions, nimbly dodging blades and bullets, always putting herself, her body, her shield between the Garleans and the wounded.

Nothing could stop her. Even when an enemy landed a blow, Krile and Alphinaud were right behind her, their healing keeping her on her feet, preventing her from losing even the slightest bit of momentum.

And then she saw Y’shtola, crumpled on the ground beside Lyse, in a pool of blood.

She skidded to a halt. 

Krile, thankfully, had the presence of mind to keep moving, rushing to Y’shtola’s side, Alphinaud close on her heels. Only when she saw the telltale shimmer of aether passing from Krile’s hands to the fallen Scion did Rinh’s heart begin to beat again. She hustled to catch up with the healers, thinking that maybe—  _ maybe—  _ the situation, dire as it was, could still be salvaged.

“Your friends were a disappointment,” said a man’s voice, right behind Rinh. He speaks utterly without affect, but perhaps just the slightest tinge of piqued curiosity, as though catching the Warrior of Light flat-footed in the middle of a battlefield was of only mild interest.

Rinh turned around, and found herself confronted by a veritable giant. Pureblooded Garleans tended to tower over her as a matter of course, but this man was nearly as tall as a roegadyn— and, in his bulky armor, nearly as broad as one, too.

“But you…” he said, stepping forward,  _ “You  _ will entertain me, will you not?”

Zenos yae Galvus. Legate of the XII legion, viceroy of Gyr Abania and Doma. The crown prince.

_ Shite, _ Rinh thought,  _ this could be bad. _ But there was nothing for it but to do what she always does— square her shoulders, raise her shield, and put herself in between those she would protect and those who would dare to harm them.

“I’m no one’s bloody  _ entertainment,” _ Rinh spat.

Zenos drew a long, lethal-looking katana, which was  _ already  _ something not going to plan; she’d expected a gunblade, so she’d been bracing herself for a volley of shots that weren’t coming. She hastily adjusted her stance.

Zenos began advancing on her, his pace deliberate but utterly implacable. “I know all about you, eikon slayer,” he said, “I know where you came from. Where you sharpened those claws of yours. This is a dance you have long known the steps to; the question is merely how well you perform them.”

For a moment, Rinh really did feel like she was back on the bloodsands, and the prince the opposing gladiator and the crowd baying for blood both.

She was at Rhalgr’s Reach, she reminded herself. She was at Rhalgr’s Reach. Y’shtola was behind her. Y’shtola, and Krile and Alphinaud and Lyse. Zenos can think whatever he wants; she was fighting for  _ them. _ For the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, for her family.

Zenos was intent on closing the distance, she thought, and for good reason-- his size and the length of his blade gave him a clear advantage in reach. But a strong sword-arm was hardly Rinh’s only weapon; bright aether swelled around her.

_ “Requiescat!” _ she barks, and a lance of unaspected aether shoots towards the prince, blooming into six radial blades of pure light upon impact.

He didn’t stumble— he didn’t even  _ flinch— _ but he did take a half-step backwards, breaking his stride.

And then, with inhuman speed, he was upon her before she could mount any sort of defence. All she could do was spring backwards, barely avoiding a slash that passed less than an ilm from her face.

After that, the onslaught was relentless. Every blow she parried, every strike she dodged, every vicious slice that cut through armor instead of flesh forced her further back, giving up ground, letting Zenos inch closer to Y’shtola and the other wounded.

She tried pushing back, but every riposte she attempted was effortlessly turned aside, every attack seemed to result in her sword being where Zenos suddenly wasn’t. He was far, far faster than his massive frame and heavy armor suggested; more than that, he was expertly reading Rinh’s movements, anticipating her every action, always staying a half-step ahead of her.

She couldn’t let herself get forced any further back, she decided; otherwise, it would only be a matter of time before he pushed past her and reached those she was trying to defend.

She didn’t want to even  _ think  _ about what would happen then.

So she drew on still more of her aether, redirected it into her shield, and  _ pushed. _ Zenos seemed to be caught off-guard, as if he’d been bracing himself against Rinh’s natural weight, not a blast of pure magic. She’d managed to stagger him.

But only for a moment. He swiftly regained his footing and lunged at her, swinging his sword in a wide arc. It connected with her shield not with the terrible clang she expected, but the screech of metal tearing.

Her shield— her precious shield, a gift from Edmont de Fortemps himself, a token from a father mourning his son to a woman mourning her love— was rent in twain. Its two halves clattered to the ground.

_ Oh,  _ thought Rinh,  _ I’m a dead woman. _

With no real defense left to speak of, she unleashed a furious offense, a flurry of hacking and slashing. But she was desperate, now, and sloppy, and more than a little afraid.

Zenos was just a man, she tried to tell herself. He was just a man, and she’d faced far mightier foes— incarnated gods, ancient dragons, enormous warmachina— and won.

But never alone.

He grabbed her wrist. Her blood ran cold. Her heart was pounding. Somewhere, a thousand thousand malms away, she heard her sword hit the ground. Every nerve in her body wanted to freeze in place, every animal instinct told her to submit, to back down, to let whatever is to happen happen.

_ If I do that, _ she thought,  _ he’s going to kill me. And then he’s going to kill Shtola. _

So she struggled to free herself from his grasp, she kicked, she thrashed, she even tried to bite. It was almost certainly futile— but as long as she kept fighting, there was a  _ chance.  _ If she didn’t, she had no chance at all.

He lifted her off the ground by the wrist, easily bearing her weight one-handed, looking her in the eye with that death’s head mask of his.

“No hunter at all,” he said, shaking his head, “Just another snarling beast.” He tossed her roughly to the ground. She tried to scramble backwards, to pick up her sword again, to get on her feet and  _ fight. _ She cannot—  _ cannot—  _ let it end like this.

Just as she was staggering to her feet, he kicked her, hard, in the head, sending her sprawling backwards into the sand. She felt dazed. Blood was running down the side of her face. But she had to keep fighting, she had to at least stand up again.

He swung his sword at her; a line of white-hot pain exploded all along her side.

Everything hurt. Her vision was blurring at the edges. She wondered, vaguely, if she was already dying.

But she got back up again, coughing up blood; what else could she do?

This time, he aimed a more decisive blow at her, right at her center of mass, his bloodied blade singing with aether. He landed a vicious slash diagonally across her torso, shredding her armor from her collarbone to her waist.

She had to… she had… she…

She looked up at Zenos, but he had eyes only for his blade; that last blow had broken it in half. He carelessly let it fall to the ground.

“Pathetic,” he said, although whether he was referring to the sword, the vanquished Warrior of Light, or both, Rinh couldn’t say.

She tried to crawl forward; even if standing was beyond her, she had to try  _ something.  _ The salty Gyr Abanian earth stung in her wounds. She was covered with blood; the ground around her was too, now.

“Rinh’a,” she murmured hoarsely, “Koh’sae… Haurchefant… Shtola…” She slumped over, face down, and the world went dark.

***

“Lass?” said a gruff voice, “You all right, lass?”

“I’m… not dead?” Rinh said, weakly. She opened her eyes to find Raubahn Aldynn looming over her.

“To best the likes of you…” he said, looking not quite at Rinh but past her, “Zenos is not what I took him to be.”

A conjurer in the yellow greatcoat of the Adders-- a fellow Keeper of the Moon-- was kneeling beside her, channeling aether into her body; Rinh could feel some semblance of strength returning to her as her bleeding stopped and slowed. “That’s the best I can do for her, but she’ll live,” she said, setting her branch down. She smiled at the fallen Warrior of Light. “Glad you pulled through, miss. You’re an inspiration to all us Keepers.”

“What happened to the Garleans?” Rinh asked.

“They withdrew,” said Raubahn. He looked around the Reach; fires were still smoldering here and there, the ground was still strewn with the dead and dying. Those left physically unharmed were mostly milling about in various states of shock. “Suppose they decided the damage was done.”

Rinh took a deep breath— or tried to. Her chest hurt; she realized that even with her wounds closed, she must still be covered in heavy bruises, tender scars, maybe a cracked rib or two. “Well,” she said, “They weren’t wrong.” 

With a pained groan, she got herself up into a half-sitting position, supporting her weight with her elbows. She could see Krile, Alphinaud, and Lyse a short distance away, still tending to Y’shtola and Commander Kemp.

“Rinh?” said Krile, looking back over her shoulder, “I hate to ask this of you when you’ve only just regained consciousness, but you’re a healer and you’re not dead, so I could  _ really  _ use your help right now.”

“Alright,” Rinh said, without hesitation; if anything, she was glad for an opportunity to do  _ something _ useful after being so soundly defeated. When she tried to stand up, though, the line carved across her body by Zenos erupted with pain. She felt woozy and light-headed; for a few moments, she was even worried that the wound had opened up again. Relief swept over her as the pain faded back to a dull buzz and what blood she had left stayed in her body, where it ought to be. She looked up at Raubahn. “...Can you help me up?” she muttered, embarrassed.

The Flame General bent over to gently hoist her to her feet. “Up you go, gladiator.”

She still felt dizzy, but if she leaned on Raubahn, she figured she could probably stay upright long enough to limp a few yalms to reach the other Scions.

Anything but being carried. That would be humiliating; it would be  _ frightening. _ Eadwulf, her lanista, regularly used his much greater size to manhandle Rinh whenever she didn’t do what he said, or when her showings in the hypogeum were sloppy. When he lost money on her. When her attitude was “insufficiently gladiatorial.” When he was just in a bad mood. Zenos lifting her up off the ground was as shocking a blow as the loss of her shield.

Pathetic, Rinh thought, Zenos’s final declaration echoing in her mind, that the mere memory of Eadwulf can frighten her even after all this time, even after everything she’s done.

She smiled nervously. “If I’d put on a performance like  _ that _ as a gladiator, my lanista would’ve almost certainly had me whipped.” 

She expected a knowing look from Raubahn, a nod of recognition at their shared ordeal; instead, the highlander just looked horrified. “...Who  _ was _ your lanista, lass?”

Oh, right, she thought, Raubahn had already owned the Coliseum during her tenure as a gladiator, even if his reconstituted Grand Company occupied most of his attention. Were the things Eadwulf did not  _ supposed _ to happen? “Eadwulf,” she murmured, not looking him in the eye, “Eadwulf Thorne.”

“Hm,” said Raubahn, but by this point, he’d gotten Rinh to her destination; no more time to talk, then. She fixed the image of a soul crystal in her head; one brighter and paler than the one she drew upon as a paladin. The aether around her rippled. Then, all at once, a staff appeared in her hand, and her dented, torn, bloodstained, ruined armor was instantly replaced by a set of pristine white robes. The woman in those robes, however, was still as beaten and bloody as she’d been beforehand.

Leaning on her staff, she carefully lowered herself to the ground to kneel beside Krile, took a deep breath, and joined the fight to save Y’shtola’s life.

* * *

**Y’shtola**

When Y’shtola woke up, the first thing she saw was a blaze of artificial aether: ceruleum lights suspended from a cermet bulkhead. She could only barely move her head, but a glance in either direction was enough for her to get a sense of her surroundings: a brightly-lit Garlean infirmary, all stark white walls and humming magitek equipment.

For a moment, she felt nothing but pure panic— the reputation of the XII Legion’s medical and research corps preceded it, and it was hard to think of a fate worse than being left to their tender mercies. Then a more rational part of her mind stepped in; if she squinted past the glare of magitek and ceruleum, she could see the distinct aether of familiar Eorzean schools of magic, and a few figures milling about wearing Alliance colors. Clearly, she was in Castrum Oriens.

_ Well, _ she thought, closing her eyes again,  _ that’s all right, then. _

***

Two days later, Y’shtola was awake, alert, and  _ bored out of her godsdamned mind. _ She knew she had to rest; a healer herself, she knew better than to disobey chiurgeon’s orders— and even if she  _ didn’t,  _ she was still too weak it was difficult to do anything more strenuous than sitting up in bed.

The only thing to break up the monotony, then, was the occasional visitor who came calling on her. She saw Krile the most, of course, but still not very often— now that Y’shtola was no longer in danger of dying, a healer of her calibre was usually needed elsewhere; the debacle at Rhalgr’s Reach had left many, many casualties in its wake.

The other Scions drifted in and out whenever they had a moment to spare amidst their preparations for an audacious— and, Y’shtola thought, rather desperate— attempt to open up a second front against the empire in the Far East. Lyse was apologetic, as if being in the path of a murderous prince was due to some sort of personal failing on her part, but Y’shtola knew she was talking about Papalymo as much as she was about what had happened at the Reach. Alphinaud’s tone was chiding; Y’shtola had known him long enough to tell that this was just his way of expressing concern, and did her best to be patient, but she still felt slightly put out by it.

Rinh was the last to come by; her injuries, while nowhere near as bad as Y’shtola’s, were still enough to keep her off her feet for several days.

When she did make an appearance at Y’shtola’s bedside, she still looked rather worse for wear— bruises on her face, a black eye, bandages visible underneath the loose shirt she wore. “Shtola…”

“I suppose you’re here to scold me for my recklessness, too,” said Y’shtola.

Rinh shook her head. “That’d be rather hypocritical of me, wouldn’t it?”

Y’shtola managed a pained smile. “Extraordinarily so.”

“So,” said Rinh, lacing her fingers through Y’shtola’s, “What I’ll say is this: I’m so sorry you got hurt, I’m so relieved you’re going to be okay, and I’m so bloody grateful you saved Lyse’s life. And I’m going to fucking  _ kill _ Zenos.”

“That is easier said than done.”

Rinh shrugged. “Fair.”

“But, in any case— thank you.” Y’shtola gave Rinh’s hands a little squeeze; Rinh answered by leaning in to softly kiss her forehead. “I wish I could repay your kindness by lending actual material aid to your efforts in Doma, instead of being stuck convalescing and contributing nothing— but it will be some time before my wounds are healed, and longer still before I’m in any condition to take the field.”

“Hey,” murmured Rinh, “You’re not doing  _ nothing.  _ Auntie always said that recovery is  _ work.  _ This one time my sister Navri got her leg caught in a trap some asshole left lying around in the woods. Kept her off her feet for  _ weeks,  _ and it drove her up the bloody wall. Since she was our family’s best hunter besides Mum herself, and there was never— never enough to eat. So Navri felt like she  _ had _ to contribute, but couldn’t, wasn’t.”

“I think I can see where this metaphor is headed, Rinh,” said Y’shtola.

“Yes, well, it still applies, all right?” Rinh said, the ghost of a smile playing across her features. “ _ Anyroad.  _ When I was helping Aunt Sizha take care of her— mixing potions and such— she reminded my sister, over and over again, that getting better  _ was  _ contributing; being able to hunt again meant taking the time to let her leg heal properly.”

In the years since she’d first met Rinh, Y’shtola had heard a lot about Sizha Panipahr— witch, midwife, and family wise woman; rigorous scholar, gifted conjurer, and forest polymath. 

She’d never met Sizha, and she never  _ would _ meet Sizha— but she loved Rinh, and it was clear her aunt had done much to shape the woman she grew up into, so Y’shtola felt a sort of affection— gratitude, maybe— for Sizha. Something about the way Rinh spoke of her aunt always reminded Y’shtola of Matoya. Maybe not as stubborn as Matoya;  _ certainly  _ not as prickly, but formidable in much the same way.

“So,” Rinh said, “Shtola. Don’t feel bad about concentrating on getting better for a while. For the sake of everything you’ll do when you've healed.”

***

It had been two months since the balance of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn had decamped to the Far East; Y’shtola figured the  _ Misery  _ would just be reaching Kugane around then.

Provided the ship hadn’t met some sort of misfortune at sea.

Y’shtola did her best not to think about that.

Her own progress felt agonizingly slow at times. She was back at the Rising Stones, at least— much more comforting surroundings than the commandeered Garlean infirmary of an ex-imperial castrum— but familiarity alone did little to blunt her frustration that the most strenuous physical activity she could handle was a slow lap around Revenant’s Toll once a day.

So she sought out mental exercise instead. Studying occupied much of her time; she wouldn’t let her period of enforced physical inactivity be compounded by letting her spellcasting get rusty. But even  _ that _ only got her so far; she needed a goal, she needed something to work towards just to stop her mind from scratching itself raw.

After a sennight spent loitering around the Rising Stones, she finally found it: she would, by hook or by crook, find a way to beat Rinh’s brother at cards.

S’vash Tia— or, as his sister fondly called him, Vash’a— had joined the Scions at around the same time as the handful of ex-Crystal Braves who became Scions, but for precisely the opposite reason: they joined out of loyalty to Alphinaud, he joined because that was after the point a teenager was no longer in a position of authority, which had made the whole enterprise seem dubious. He resembled his sister in many ways— he had what Y’shtola was coming to think of as the Panipahr family nose, he was handy with a sword, and he put as much effort into his personal appearance as Rinh did, albeit with a calculated ostentatiousness she lacked. On the other hand, he stood nearly a fulm taller than her, he was charismatic and supremely self-assured, and he was much, much better at cards than she was.

Rinh was infamously terrible at card games; she had a good head for numbers, pattern recognition, and probability, but these advantages were more than canceled out by her complete inability to bluff convincingly or read her opponents; one could generally guess the contents of her hand with startling accuracy just by noticing her expression or the twitching of her ears as she looked at her cards, but she would still take everything other players said or did at face value. It had become an unspoken rule among the Scions that, to protect the Warrior of Light from herself, she should never, ever be allowed to stake actual money on a game.

S’vash had his sister’s aptitude for figures— before coming to the Scions, he’d been an Assessor at Melvaan’s Gate, and few magical disciplines were more mathematical than arcanistry. Unlike Rinh, however, he could read people like an open book, and had the acting chops to easily lead opponents astray.

He always beat Y’shtola.

It was  _ infuriating. _

On this particular occasion, they were playing in the public area of the Seventh Heaven. Y’shtola didn’t like the idea of having an audience watch her get trounced repeatedly, but it was nice to be around people again— people at their ease, not clashing on a battlefield. With Rinh, Lyse, Alisaie, Alphinaud and Tataru en route to Doma, Urianger minding the Waking Sands back in Thanalan, and most of the others still in Ala Mhigo, the Rising Stones was nearly deserted, and unnervingly quiet.

Y’shtola, as was her wont, was playing fairly defensively, conservative in her bets and raises. She knew she couldn’t do that forever, though— it just meant she was slowly losing a war of attrition, her piles of chips eroding away as S’vash’s waxed. With Rinh safely located a hemisphere away, there was real gil tied up in this game, too; the pot didn’t exceed the price of, say, a nice meal at the Bismarck, a bottle of La Noscean white with a decent vintage, or the first edition of a somewhat uncommon book, but it was the  _ principle  _ of the thing.

She realized that she was more or less exclusively thinking of the money in terms of things Rinh would like— the Twelve know she deserves a gift, after everything. All the more reason to win, then.

Y’shtola’s hopes were revived when she drew a new hand and found herself with a truly excellent set of cards. She affected nonchalance. 

“Fold,” said S’vash, tossing his own hand aside; he’d seen right through her, evidently.

Or perhaps he’d seen something else; there was a faint fluctuation in the aether around him, like someone had skipped a stone over the surface of a placid pond some moments earlier. It was similar in kind— if not in magnitude— to an aetheric phenomenon she sometimes saw around Rinh, and had learned to recognize after she’d collapsed at that ball in Ishgard— the Echo.

“You always play circles around me,” she said mildly.

S’vash grinned as he shuffled the deck. “Call it natural talent.”

She considered calling him out on this, but decided against it. She was going to be stuck here convalescing for quite some time, after all— she might as well pick out a goal that will keep her busy for as much of it as possible.

***

She got a letter from Rinh the next day.

_ Shtola, _

_ We’re finally back in civilisation. Stepping into Kugane after months at sea provoked something like sensory overload. The lights! The colours! The throngs of people from all corners of Hydaelyn crowding the streets! It’s quite overwhelming. _

_ Not that our voyage was  _ completely  _ uneventful. We  _ did  _ take a detour through some sort of… haunted island? (and learned Alphinaud is v. afraid of ghosts; admittedly, the ghosts out on the high seas are considerably less friendly than our family ghosts) But for the most part I rested. I expect to have barely a moment’s ease once we get to Doma, so I’m glad that I was able to take a brief break from my exciting lifestyle of being hit with swords (bullets, axes, magic, &c.) and let myself recover a bit from the Reach. I’ve a few new scars to show for it, but that aside I feel more or less like my old self again. I hope your own convalescence is proceeding equally well. _

_ There’s something odd about being on neutral ground after all that time fighting tooth and nail on the Gyr Abanian front. There’s something eerie about walking by a Garlean embassy and exchanging icy glares with the soldiers posted outside, when more or less anywhere else in the world we'd all be trying to kill one another sharpish. _

Later.  _ A spy attempted to sell us out to the Garleans, forcing us to dispatch someone half dozen of them and then traverse Kugane’s back-alleys and canals as alarums rang out and the local constabulary combed the city looking for us, which is much more in line with how I expect things to be. _

_ Anyroad. Its moral cowardice in aiding and abetting the empire via ‘neutrality’ aside, I think you’d like Kugane. Excellent tea houses, legions of booksellers, a parallel geomatic system of aetherology to plumb the depths of, a general air of cultivated refinement— this, I thought, is a city that has Y’shtola Rhul, Ar.Aet written all over it! Some day— when all of this is over, when we have opportunities for leisure more substantial than, say, convalescing after a mad prince tries to slice us in half— we should come here together. Just you and me. _

_ Something to look forward to, anyroad. _

_ Miss you terribly. _

_ Love, _

_ Your Rinh _

_ P.S. These letters likely aren’t secure— please see our coded messages from Tataru if you want to be apprised of our progress re: non-sightseeing endeavours. The (rather pricey) aetheryte courier service I’ve engaged to see this letter delivered in a timely manner can be trusted with private correspondence, but not  _ secret  _ correspondence. _

_ P.P.S. Please find enclosed a daguerreotype of my tits. _

Y’shtola’s wounds still troubled her, her fears for the future— for Ala Mhigo, for Doma, for the Scions of the Seventh Dawn and for her beloved— still harried her. But the letter restored to her a warmth she hadn’t felt in months. Even across such an inconceivable distance, the tie that bound herself to Rinh had yet to snap. She was with her, still, the seas and continents separating them in space notwithstanding.


	8. the measure of her reach

**Y’shtola**

All of Ala Mhigo— perhaps all of Eorzea, or even all the free world— was still in a festival mood, a full day after Zenos yae Galvus and his pet Primal had been vanquished and the capital city liberated.

Y’shtola’s feelings were a bit mixed. The Scions of the Seventh Dawn were— rightfully— the toast of the town. But Y’shtola’s own contribution felt meager compared to the heavy lifting the likes of Lyse (“Commander Hext!” She’d come a long way from the girl who hid behind her sister’s name and mask, trying to outrun her grief) or Rinh (because of  _ course _ it all came down to her, in the end) had done for the cause of liberty. She felt like an imposter, basking in others’ accomplishments, the way her father used to.

Rinh, she knew, would have none of this. Rinh would remind her that she’d sacrificed for Ala Mhigo,  _ bled _ for Ala Mhigo. Her convalescence had kept her out of the action— even now, with her wound itself more or less healed, she needed some time yet for the physiotherapy and reconditioning to prepare her for the rigors of the battlefield— but the  _ reason _ for that convalescence was a confrontation with the crown prince himself.

Possibly, it was simply that she just never knew what to do with herself at parties. This celebration was nothing like the fiercely competitive fetes her parents threw, which were invariably excruciating affairs from start to finish, but she still felt distinctly out of her element. Mingling did not come naturally to her.

She worked her way through the people thronging the streets in various states of euphoria, revelry, and inebriation, looking for a familiar face. Contending with the crowds was difficult enough on its own, but she also found herself needing to take frequent breaks to stop and rest; her wounds still troubled her and she was rather out of shape.

It was during one such breaks that she felt a hand on her shoulder; she looked up and Lyse’s grinning face hoved into view.

“Shtola!” said Lyse, “How have you  _ been?” _

Y’shtola shrugged, but a smile played across her own face; seeing Lyse’s high spirits did much to lift her own. “A bit overwhelmed, truth be told.”

“I know, right?” Lyse said, laughing, “Here we are, in the streets of an Ala Mhigo that’s free, but it’s still barely sunk in! A year ago, the empire felt invincible, and now they’re gonna have to redraw the maps for not one but  _ two  _ continents!”

“I meant to refer to my feelings about being surrounded by a richly-deserved but still extraordinarily raucous celebration,” Y’shtola said, “But I suppose that  _ does _ rather pale in comparison to the grand sweep of revolutionary history, the crumbling of once-unassailable empires,  _ et cetera, et cetera.” _

A few yalms away, Y’shtola noticed a small stir in the crowd. She supposed it was a collision between the celebrants and someone carrying out the business left to attend to after victory— an Alliance runner, perhaps, or one of the engineers sent to salvage and remove the broken imperial warmachina littering the streets.

Finally, though, the crowd parted, and out came the Warrior of Light, bounding towards her comrades, arms outstretched. She more or less collided with Y’shtola and Lyse, pulling both of them into a tight embrace.

“We did it!” said Rinh, “We actually  _ did it!” _ When she finally let go, taking a half-step back from the other Scions, Y’shtola noticed she had tears in her eyes. “It still barely feels real, you know? All this time where it felt like the most we could do again the Garleans was slow the bleeding, and now— and  _ now—  _ holy shit?”

This wasn’t the first time she’d seen Rinh since her return from the East, of course— Rinh had made a point of calling upon her at the Rising Stones before she leapt into the Ala Mhigan fire once more. By that point, however, events were unfolding far too rapidly for her to linger overlong; the war was entering a critical phase, the Eorzeans were preparing to make another push across the Velodyna, and Krile was being held somewhere behind imperial lines. Rinh— quite understandably— seemed to have one foot out the door the moment she arrived. She was already suited up for action— wearing a new set of armor, a hefty Bozjan-style gunblade strapped to her back. The whole time Y’shtola and Rinh had spoken, Rinh was anxiously charging cartridge after cartridge with aether.

Now, though, one look was enough to make it clear a weight had been lifted off Rinh’s shoulders, both literally— she was unarmored and visibly unarmed, although Y’shtola knew that she habitually kept a knife hidden on her person since the banquet— and figuratively, with a spring in her step and her shining aether sparking and bubbling with joy.

“How are you feeling, Rinh?” Y’shtola asked. 

_ “Exhausted!”  _ answered Rinh, with a wide smile on her face.

“Can’t say I blame you!” Lyse said, “Fighting primals is tiring work!”

“Hey,” says Rinh, “That was just the  _ coup de grâs _ . I’d have never even got through the city gates or up into the Menagerie without everyone else at my back. We’ve all come down a long, long road together-- so this victory belongs to everyone.”

Y’shtola couldn’t help but think guiltily of the fact that she’d spent the bulk of that long road lying in bed, reading and writing letters, and losing a small but steady stream of gil to Rinh’s brother in her failed campaign to best him at cards.

On the other hand, she reminded herself, if she  _ hadn’t _ thrown herself in front of Zenos’s sword, Lyse would be dead-- and  _ that  _ thought was too horrible to contemplate further. She remembered Rinh’s words to her at Castrum Oriens--  _ I’m so sorry you got hurt, I’m so relieved you’re going to be okay, and I’m so bloody grateful you saved Lyse’s life. And I’m going to fucking kill Zenos. _ The debacle at the Reach, the defeat she suffered, was still a link in the chain of events that ultimately saw Ala Mhigo free and its viceroy lying dead in a pool of his own blood. That was  _ something _ , at least.

“Aw, Rinh!” Lyse said, “I love it when you do this thing where you’re so humble but  _ also _ give a little speech about being humble that sounds like something  _ Alphinaud  _ would say.”

“Oh, gods,” Rinh said, wincing, “Is that  _ really _ what I sound like?”

“Sorry!” said Lyse, who did not look even slightly sorry.

Y’shtola smiled as she watched the easy back-and-forth between Rinh and Lyse; the two of them really had been thick as thieves since their Far Eastern sojourn.

***

“Can you believe we’re just… going for an evening stroll through the streets of  _ Ala Mhigo,” _ said Rinh, “Somehow, that makes all this feel way more— way more concrete than seeing Zenos dead in the dirt, or seeing his surviving tribunes surrender to the Resistance, or everyone singing the national anthem or whatever. It’s like… this is just a  _ place,  _ you know? Am I making any sense?”

The three women had drifted away from the noise and crowds of the celebrations; Rinh had been too polite to say anything, but Y’shtola could tell that Rinh had started to find it all a bit taxing— the unstructured socializing, the drinks of unknown provenance offered to her by strangers she dared not touch, the hours and hours of having to be the Warrior of Light in a semi-official capacity. The Warrior of Light had more than done her bit, Y’shtola reasoned; surely Rinh Panipahr deserved to have a nice time, too, even if it took a bit of prodding on Y’shtola’s part to get her to acknowledge it.

Lyse seemed to have much the same idea; once Y’shtola had steered them away from the party, Lyse took the lead, clearly with some more specific destination in mind. “I always wondered about what this city was like,” she said, “I can just barely remember Ala Gannha, but not this place. I think… I think Dad took me here, once, but I must’ve been so little… So I only ever knew it from stories Yda would tell me.”

They came to a heap of rubble stretching across the width of the street. Y’shtola supposed it was the remnants of a triumphal arch-- the stone was a dark, polished Ilsabardian marble, rather than the warm sandstone quarried in Gyr Abania; she could see fragments of fluted columns and the ornate capitals that sat atop them, instantly recognizable to anyone who’d spent time in Sharlayan, where similar columns held up many a roof and lined many a colonnade. The inscription on the shattered and half-buried frieze was still partially legible: C·V·BAELSAR·LEGATVS·AUG·PRO·PRAETORE·FECIT. Beneath it lay a toppled statue of Emperor Solus zos Galvus, staring off into eternity with features frozen in an idealized youth even now, dashed to bits on the cobblestones. Two soldiers-- one in Resistance khaki, the other in the white armor of a Temple Knight-- were perched atop the debris, laughing at some private joke as they passed a bottle of arak back and forth. They seemed to have eyes only for one another; neither of them so much as glanced at the Scions as Rinh and Lyse helped Y’shtola clamber over the fallen monument, each holding one of their still-convalescing comrade’s hands.

Y’shtola was a bit embarrassed that she still wasn’t able to just scramble up and down the heaped rubble under her own steam, but that was more than made up for by how well taken care of she felt with both Rinh and Lyse doting on her. When Y’shtola’s feet were once again firmly on the flat surface of Ala Mhigo’s cobbled streets, Rinh leaned in and gallantly kissed her on the cheek.

“This neighborhood is where a lot of imperial officers and bureaucrats lived,” said Lyse. Some of the buildings around them were stately old Ala Mhigan townhouses, some of them were newer Garlean villas, and all of them had been lightly ransacked. “We’ve been billeting troops and refugees who lost their homes in the fighting here, but I guess right now everyone’s off partying?” She shrugged. “Anyway! Seems as good a place as any to take a load off— get off our feet for a while, right?”

Y’shtola appreciated Lyse’s use of the word  _ our _ when proposing taking a rest, instead of calling attention to the fact that Y’shtola was the one slowing them down— Lyse seemed possessed of her usual boundless energy, and Rinh’s fatigue clearly wasn’t mere physical exhaustion.

***

Lyse had commandeered for herself a relatively humble living space— a suite that once housed a junior attaché to one of Zenos’s tribunes, Arcadius sas Caepio, whose more spacious residence had been pressed into service as a headquarters for the local Resistance. Not much could be gleaned about the attaché from what he’d left behind, but apparently he’d done well enough for himself to assemble some fairly nice furniture— when Y’shtola finally sank onto the sofa, it felt positively decadent. Rinh, of course, sat right next to Y’shtola, holding her hand and contentedly laying her head on Y’shtola’s shoulder. Lyse, meanwhile, chose an armchair right across from the couch.

Lyse— if Y’shtola was being perfectly honest with herself— looked absolutely stunning. The contrast between her dress, with its ornate embroidery and flowing fabric and graceful aetheric weaving, and the tantalizing glimpses it afforded of the solid, toned muscle beneath it was nothing short of  _ arresting. _

Not sure what to do with this information, she exchanged a glance with Rinh before deciding to look down at her own hands folded in her lap insead. She felt a bit hot in the face.

“Y’know,” said Lyse, “I can tell from the way you two are looking at me you’re not just admiring the stitching on my dress. Well,  _ Rinh  _ might be.”

“H-hey,” muttered Rinh. Then, in a smaller voice: “Sorry.”

“I didn’t say it was  _ bad,”  _ Lyse said, “I’m just saying— I noticed. And, I mean, if you’re interested, let’s talk.”

“Um,” said Rinh, looking rather bewildered, “What?”

“She’s propositioning us, dearest,” Y’shtola said, “Jokingly, presumably.”

“Oh.”

“It doesn’t  _ have _ to be a joke!” Lyse winked. “I mean, we’ve all gone through hell this year, so I think you’ve more than earned a chance to just have some  _ fun _ for a change, right?”

Silence. Somewhere in the apartment, a Garlean clock precisely marked the passing seconds. If Y’shtola strained her ears, she could just barely make out the hum of fluorescent ceruleum lights.

“I mean,” Lyse added, a crack appearing in her mask of self-assured bravado, “If— if a tumble with your friend sounds fun to you, anyroad.”

Rinh lifts her head from Y’shtola’s shoulder and, with a little shrug, gives her an inquiring look. It stood to reason Rinh would be up for this, Y’shtola thought; she was bolder than she looked, even if her desires often outpaced her ability to articulate them. Rinh, like many more traditionally-minded miqo’te, Keepers and Seekers both, hewed to the idea that one should love ardently, fiercely, whole-heartedly, but not necessarily  _ exclusively.  _ They’d talked this over, of course, and Y’shtola certainly found the idea appealing in an abstract sort of way, but those conversations had lived strictly in the realm of the hypothetical. Given the years of mutual pining that preceded their relationship, Y’shtola frankly thought it a minor miracle that she even had  _ one  _ girlfriend.

Now, though, it was hard to think of anything less abstract or hypothetical than Rinh’s unspoken question, or the look on Lyse’s face as she nervously twirled her hair around one finger.

Y’shtola closed her eyes and did something contrary to her instincts but often gently encouraged by Rinh— she asked herself what  _ she _ wanted.

Well, she thought, it’s not like the liberation of Ala Mhigo happens every day.

It’s not like being reunited with your lover and a dear, dear friend after nearly half a year of only the most fleeting visits, after half a year spent without touching or being touched, happens every day.

Y’shtola nodded.

Lyse exhaled a deep breath she’d obviously been holding in, undisguised relief on her face. “Great!” 

She practically sprung up from her seat to kiss Rinh on the lips. Then she turned to Y’shtola, angled her chin upwards with calloused hands, and kissed her too. 

“Oh,” said Y’shtola, as Lyse took a seat on the sofa to Y’shtola’s right; Rinh was still to her left, leaving her flanked on both sides.

“So, um,” said Lyse, “Are there any, like, ground rules I should know? Things you wouldn’t want me to do? Things you’d definitely want me to do?”

“Uh,” said Rinh, “The fact that you’re strong enough to just pick me up off the ground is extremely hot, but if you actually  _ do _ that, I  _ will _ bite you.”

“And not in the fun way,” Y’shtola added.

“Duly noted,” Lyse said, laughing but still quite obviously listening intently.

“And, er,” continued Rinh, “Sorry if this sounds weird, but since you’re hyuran, could you like… not touch my ears or tail? Since in my experience only miqo’te really know how to do it right— people who haven’t got ears like this tend to either push or pull too hard and it hurts a bit, or overcompensate and just sort of ineffectively bat at them, leaving everyone involved feeling kind of silly.”

“Leave the ear scritches to Shtola. Got it.”

“I think…” Rinh began, leaning forward a bit so she could get a good look at both Lyse and Y’shtola, “Maybe a little more gently than usua, Shtolal? To start out, at least. Because this is new. Because over these last few months, most of the people who’ve touched me were trying to kill me.”

Sometimes, hearing Rinh say things like that so matter-of-factly broke Y’shtola’s heart. “Of course,” she said softly. She stroked Rinh’s cheek, her hand brushing across a topography of scars still intimately familiar to her, even after months apart. Rinh closed her eyes and exhaled; some of the tension seemed to lose her shoulders.

Lyse, meanwhile, had tentatively laced her fingers through Y’shtola’s, like she was still getting used to the idea that she was allowed to touch her. Her thumb idly traced circles along the soft skin at the crook of Y’shtola’s forefinger and thumb. She had an expectant, reverent look on her face Y’shtola had often seen from Rinh, too.

Ah, though Y’shtola, it’s like  _ that. _ She supposed she ought to take charge of the situation. “Shall we adjourn to the bedchamber, ladies?”

“You’re already there” Lyse said, as she advanced from merely holding Y’shtola’s hand to toying— somewhat indecisively— with the clasp of her coat, “The couch folds out into a bed.”

“So Garlean engineering’s good for something besides killer machina, giant walls, and experimental superweapons after all, actually,” said Rinh.

“Ah,” said Y’shtola, “For the moment, then, I think its present guise as a couch will more than suit our purposes.”

Rinh laughed. “Gods, Y’shtola, listen to yourself.”

“I— I am simply trying to get in-character for a role I’ve not had the good fortune to step into for quite some time.”

“So clearly, me being a brat about it is helping you out,” Rinh said, trying to stifle her giggles. It was true, though— this sort of play-fighting was an important step to the dances she and Y’shtola shared. It was mostly for Y’shtola’s benefit, really— things like her self-conscious acknowledgement of adopting a role and Rinh’s gentle pushback against her affected imperiousness were prerequisites for her own comfort. Rinh, she knew, would take equal pleasure in yielding herself fully to Y’shtola’s firm will, in becoming pliable as putty in the hands of the one person in all Eorzea she’d trust with that sort of power over her, and trust to never step over the hard lines she’d set beforehand. When they tried that, though, one gloomy winter night in Ishgard, Y’shtola had been the one invoke their safeword.

Sex involved a lot more trial and error than the torrid romances she furtively read when she was younger had implied, it turned out. A methodology familiar to any Sharlayan scholar worth her salt, although  _ perhaps _ not in this particular context.

She supposed bringing Lyse in would be much the same: a process, a conversation.

Y’shtola turned to Lyse and kissed her; Lyse reciprocated adeptly, eagerly and not a bit hungrily. She managed to get the clasp undone, revealing an expanse of bronzed skin which only grew as Rinh reached around from behind Y’shtola and began unbuttoning her coat.

Y’shtola’s own hands, meanwhile, had begun to explore Lyse in earnest. Her fingers easily slid under the silken bodice of Lyse’s dress and onto her breasts, eliciting a soft, pleased sigh.

But then something seemed to occur to Lyse. “Wait,” she said, “Hang on a second.”

Y’shtola immediately stopped what she was doing and drew back. She couldn’t help but think of the massive scar on her chest, bared for the first time to Lyse and Rinh. Was Lyse shocked? Repulsed? Still blaming herself for Y’shtola’s injury? None of those  _ seemed  _ likely, but...

She took a breath. “Is aught amiss?”

“Sorry, sorry, I just—” Lyse began, “I just don’t want to mess up this dress, is all.”

Y’shtola thought back to that last night in Ishgard, after the ball, when she’d accidentally left a massive tear in Rinh’s favorite dress. Fair enough, then.

Lyse hopped off the couch and briskly lifted her dress off over her head. She wriggled out of her leggings and smalls. She neatly folded up these garments and set them on a table— but not before she took a moment to shake her ass in Y’shtola’s general direction.

Y’shtola stared. Rinh also stared, peeking out from behind Y’shtola’s shoulder.

Lyse had  _ fantastic  _ glutes. No wonder she always used to wear those little shorts all the time.

Rinh and Lyse each had such different kinds of strength. Where Rinh was wiry and sharp, Lyse was well-built and statuesque.  _ Literally  _ statuesque, honestly; her nude form put Y’shtola in the mind of the sort of statues of athletes in motion that were in vogue in old Sharlayan a century or so ago, meant to demonstrate an artist’s skill as sculptor and anatomist both.

Rinh, her eyes never straying from Lyse, finished unbuttoning the coat and— somewhat frantically, truth be told— pulled it off Y’shtola’s shoulders, while Y’shtola rapidly divested herself from her halftights and pantalettes. She beckoned Lyse forward.

“On your knees,” Y’shtola said, doing her best to sound haughty and dignified in spite of the thrill of anticipation which shot through her, in spite of the feeling of Rinh’s hands on her body and Rinh’s mouth nipping at her neck, “And we shall see if you’re as talented with your tongue as certain graffiti in the women’s lavatory at the Rising Stones has led me to believe.”

Lyse laughed as she got down on her knees. “Oh, I’m a  _ virtuoso  _ at eating pussy.” She grinned up at Y’shtola from between her legs.

“They should give out Archonates for that,” Rinh quipped.

Y’shtola smirked. “Yet another institutional shortcoming of the Studium, I’m afr—oh!  _ Oh!”  _ Before she could finish her rejoinder, her train of thought was instantly derailed by that first electric contact of Lyse’s lips and tongue on her clit.

Lyse approached the task before her with confidence, skill, and a bottomless enthusiasm. She made minute adjustments as she went— angling Y’shtola’s hips slightly, moving Y’shtola’s legs into a more comfortable position, quickening her pace as she sensed Y’shtola teetering on the edge— with the air of a master violinist tuning her instrument.

It stood to reason, Y’shtola supposed. Lyse had more experience with women than Rinh, and more experience in general than Y’shtola, since before that first night with Rinh the fact she was a lesbian felt largely academic— so to speak— aside from determining  _ who _ she’d pine away hopelessly for with no expectation of reciprocation or intention of acting upon her desires.

After so long spent in relative solitude, to suddenly find herself being touched like  _ this—  _ behind her, the weight of Rinh pressing against her, Rinh’s hands all over her body with their delicate, precise movements, Rinh’s insistent kisses on her neck and shoulders; beneath her, Lyse, her lips wrapped around her clit, her fingers curling inside her, bringing all of her expertise and attention to bear for the singular purpose of making Y’shtola feel good— was utterly overwhelming.

It was too much. It wasn’t enough. It was perfect, perfect, perfect.

***

As the last embers of her climax finally faded, Y’shtola found herself sprawled across the couch, a fine sheen of sweat on her skin. Her head was resting on Rinh’s lap; Rinh was seated demurely, her legs folded beneath her, still fully clothed, but her golden eyes positively smouldered. She smiled, lips parted just enough to show a hint of fang. It was an expression Y’shtola seen many times before Baelsar’s Wall and all that came after forced them apart; an expression she’d yearned for as she touched herself on long, lonely nights in Mor Dhona. The gears in Rinh’s head were turning; Y’shtola reckoned she was weighing whether to wait patiently for Y’shtola’s instructions and be rewarded, or mouth off and earn herself a punishment— although both amounted to the same thing in the end.

Lyse, meanwhile, still knelt alongside the couch, massaging her aching jaw and looking extremely casual about all of this.

Rinh seemed to be holding her counsel for now, so Y’shtola was still— nominally, anyway— in control. Somewhat reluctantly, she removed herself from Rinh’s lap to sit up straight again. “I think that our dear Rinh is still wearing altogether too much clothing,” she said, “Take care of it, Lyse.”

Rinh was dressed in a rakish Limsan style,  _ relatively  _ casual by Rinh Panipahr standards, but that still meant Lyse had to contend with a justaucorps, a waistcoat, a billowy undershirt, breeches, stockings (which Y’shtola felt showed off her toned calves to good effect), and various other garments and accessories which needed to be unbuttoned, unbuckled, or untied. This gave Y’shtola a moment or two to consider her next move.

Unfortunately, as far as she knew,  _ le godemiché _ was still sitting in its box underneath Rinh’s bed—  _ their _ bed— at Fortemps Manor. That was all right, though— she was more than willing to take matters into her own hands.

So to speak.

Lyse took a step back from the couch, Rinh’s chemise balled up in her hands until she carelessly tossed it aside. “Ta da,” she said.

_ “Shtola,”  _ whined Rinh, “Hurry up and do  _ something  _ to me.”

Instantly, Y’shtola’s hands were all over Rinh; she traced the shapes of Rinh’s scars, some familiar, some new; the long, jagged mark left by Rinh’s own wounds from the Reach she treated with particular reverence. When she had worked her way down between Rinh’s legs, just the slightest touch was enough for Y’shtola to confirm that her lover was already soaking wet-- and enough to make Rinh gasp and squirm.

“Impatient as ever, then,” Y’shtola murmured, amused. “Lyse, be a dear and hold her in place. Gently but  _ firmly.”  _ She glanced in Rinh’s direction for confirmation; when Rinh gave her an encouraging little nod, she continued, “We can’t have her getting too far ahead of herself, now.”

“Wow,” said Lyse, “You two are  _ such _ dorks!” She slipped behind Rinh, straddling her, wrapping those exquisitely honed arms of hers around the smaller woman’s waist. “It’s really cute, honestly.”

Y’shtola took a moment to make sure she was positioned comfortably— she anticipated being between Rinh’s legs for quite some time, after all. Satisfied, she leaned in and kissed Rinh— first on the lips, then lower, on her neck and shoulders, on her long scar from the Reach, on her breasts, mouthing at a stiffened nipple. Her hands, meanwhile, slid downwards, across a muscled abdomen criss-crossed by scars and stretch marks, through the dark curls at the apex of her thighs, and finally into the liquid heat below. Without further preamble, she buried three fingers fingers to the knuckle inside Rinh.

_ “Shtola,” _ Rinh breathed, as Y’shtola began to fuck her, thrusting her fingers into her at a rapidly accelerating pace, rubbing her clit with her thumb,  _ “Fuck,  _ Shtola, just—  _ fuck!”  _ Rinh’s breath began to hitch with each new thrust— her murmured obscenities became a jumbled stream of Huntspeak before descending into complete incoherence. Her brilliant aether pulsed and vibrated like water mere moments away from boiling over.

So— of  _ course—  _ Y’shtola abruptly withdrew her hand.

_ “Shtolaaaa,”  _ implored Rinh, her hips bucking wildly, “Shtola,  _ please,  _ just let me come—” She wriggled and writhed, looking for relief, for friction, for  _ anything,  _ straining to no avail against Lyse’s grip; Y’shtola thought that lended a certain _ frisson  _ to the proceedings, which she appreciated.

“Shush,” Y’shtola purred, pressing a still-slick finger to Rinh’s lips, “Only good girls get to come. Are you a good girl, my dearest?”

Rinh took a deep breath and nodded.

“Then trust that I shall take care of you.”

And she did.

Several times, in fact.

* * *

**Rinh**

Rinh woke up as the first rays of a crimson sunrise crept across the room.

Y’shtola, as usual, woke up before her, but hadn’t gotten out of bed yet; she was reading a book, one hand idly carding through Rinh’s hair. They’d seamlessly stepped back into their old routine, as if the time they’d been oceans apart had passed in the blink of an eye.

On the other side of her, Lyse was still asleep and snoring quietly, one arm draped over Rinh. This, too, struck a familiar note, Rinh realized— she and Lyse had spent much of the last six moons in close quarters.

Lyse had been with her at the Reach; in the aftermath, they’d huddled together, watching each shallow rise and fall of Y’shtola’s chest. They’d been cabinmates on the  _ Misery,  _ hammocks slung side-by-side from the night they’d left Limsa Lominsa to the day the lights of Kugane appeared over the horizon. They shared accommodations at the Shiokaze Hostelry, they’d slept in yurts, in trenches, in caves and castrums, under the sheltering boughs of trees. On one occasion, they’d slept under the stars— when they’d finally returned to Mol Iloh in triumph after the Nadaam, they’d been so bone-tired they fell asleep right on the grass, nothing below them but the naked earth, nothing above but a billion billion stars.

No wonder, then, that they’d grown so close— although the exact nature of those tender feelings had eluded Rinh until Y’shtola was at her side again and able to give a helpful prod in the right direction.

Lyse looked so soft like this, Rinh thought; muscles she’d seen shatter stone and break bones lying slack and at rest.

Rinh sat up— carefully, to avoid jostling Lyse awake— and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

“Good morning,” murmured Y’shtola, closing her book— a rather hefty Sharlayan monograph called  _ Towards a New Aetherology: An Aetherodynamic Approach—  _ and setting it aside. She smiled sleepily at Rinh; Rinh could feel her heart flutter in response.

Rinh blinked, and blinked again, and then she realized she was blinking back tears.

“Is something wrong?” Y’shtola asked softly, wrapping her arms protectively around the Warrior of Light.

“N-no,” Rinh mumbled, sniffling, “It’s just— it’s just that I can’t believe how  _ happy _ I am right now. I’ve— we’ve  _ all _ been through so much, but here we are. Here we are, having a lazy morning in a free Ala Mhigo.”

“It is overwhelming in any  _ number _ of ways,” Y’shtola agreed, her thumb drawing slow circles in the close-cropped hairs at the nape of Rinh’s neck, “But you’re right: here we are.”

“When— when I think back to before— to after the—” Rinh trailed off. “After the Calamity,” she continued, tears flowing freely, “I— I didn’t think I’d even be  _ alive _ all this time later, much less alive and loving so much, and being so loved in turn.”

Y’shtola kissed her on the forehead. She kneaded Rinh’s ear with just the right amount of firmness and pressure, eliciting a noise halfway between a sigh and a purr.

***

They whiled away the whole morning like that, Rinh and Y’shtola, and Lyse when she finally woke up. They talked, they read (even when traveling light, the two miqo’te tended to have at least a few books stowed away somewhere), they dozed, they fucked. They just generally lazed around for hours and hours.

For once, there was nowhere else to be, nothing else to be done, no pressing matters or brewing crises to attend to. 

For at least one morning, they could just  _ be. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> big thanks to [the bookclub discord](https://discord.gg/enabling-debauched-xivfic), without which i probably would've never had the nerve to post fics that are this smutty :V


	9. umbral light

**Y’shtola**

One moment, Y’shtola was discussing Thancred’s condition with Rinh, Urianger, and Alisaie.

The next, she was being torn apart. Something had gotten its hooks into Y’shtola’s soul and was pulling it away, swift and strong as the Lifestream’s current. Aether was churning around her in patterns she couldn’t even begin to interpret, while all traces of the familiar— Rinh’s luminous soul, the dim but homey aether of the Rising Stones, the feeling of her feet planted firmly on the ground— receded into the distance. She reached towards Rinh, desperate, floundering. Rinh’s eyes were shut, her ears pressed flat against her head, fangs bared, face contorted in agony.

And then Y’shtola finally felt herself wrenched away.

***

She was somewhere else, in freefall through time and space. It was almost like the Lifestream— a chaotic torrent of everywhere and everywhen— but the very fact she was able to make that observation meant she had to be somewhere else. The Lifestream, after all, swept her objective self away along with everything else. 

Huge chunks of crystalized aether— or something that looked like that to her eyes, anyway— tumbled through the void, leaving echoes of memory in their wake.

Matoya, decades younger, when Y’shtola first met her:  _ “The girl simply wants for useful occupation.” _

Y’rhul Nunh, leading a toast in sparking company:  _ “Your accomplishments have reflected well on the Y tribe, daughter of mine.” _

Louisoix, giving a fiery speech at the last meeting of the Forum before it fled across the sea: _ “To ignore the plight of those one might conceivably save is not wisdom— it is indolence.” _

Thancred, deep underground, daggers glimmering in rapidly-approaching lantern light:  _ “Now, may I have the last dance?” _

Rinh, Rinh, her Rinh, sitting in an Ishgardian parlour:  _ “Shtola, I’m terribly fond of you.” _

Minfilia, silhouetted against a wall of burning Light.

***

Y’shtola was lying naked on a cold marble floor. She had no idea where she was; she was disoriented enough that she couldn’t make sense of the aether around her, familiar and foreign and shot through with something stale and dead.

“Oh dear,” said a man’s voice, refined and Sharlayan, “I only thought to bring  _ one _ robe.”

Then he tossed a robe at her and scurried away, echoing footsteps fading into the distance.

After she’d gotten the robe on and stood up, Y’shtola took stock of her surroundings. She was in a circular room with some sort of portal and one end and a door and the other. Urianger was sitting upright, but still seemingly dazed; Y’shtola, regrettably, added him to her mental list of Scions of the Seventh Dawn she’d seen naked. Neither Rinh nor Alisaie were present; they had, thank the Twelve, been spared whatever fate had befallen Urianger and herself.

The architecture of the room was distinctly Allagan— the more ornate, monumental style seen in places like Syrcus Tower, rather than the brutalist geometry and exposed magitek works found in, say, the various laboratories and installations that dotted the landscape of Azys Ala. When she focused on the aether surrounding her, though, it was clear that beneath the marble floors and gilded columns, powerful Allagan magitek was churning away.

There was something else about the aether here that bothered her, but before she could put her finger on it, the man from before returned bearing a robe, which he duly flung in Urianger’s general direction without looking directly at him. He was wearing robes himself, with a hood casting his face in shadow. No, that wasn’t quite right— there was a subtle aetheric irregularity that indicated he was using some manner of illusory magic to deepen the shadows cast by the cowl, concealing his features. Between his slight build, the pains he took to conceal the top of his head and his eyes, and the way he smelled, Y’shtola reckoned that he was a miqo’te.

He also looked as if he was something like a third of the way towards turning into crystal, but Y’shtola— for the moment— refrained from making any suppositions about this.

“Who are you?” asked Y’shtola, arms folded.

“I am called the Crystal Exarch,” he said, “And we have much to discuss, Y’shtola Rhul.”

***

“So,” Y’shtola said, staring up at the silhouette of the Crystal Tower, incongruously familiar next to the unfamiliar city of bricks and wrought-iron beneath it and the blazing dead sky above, “To summarize: We are on the First Shard of Hydaelyn, from whence came Arbert and his fellow Warriors of Darkness.”

“His true name was Ardbert,” said the Exarch, prompting Y’shtola to roll her eyes, “But yes, that’s correct.”

“You intended to summon the Warrior of Light here, as this world’s salvation is required to forestall an Eighth Umbral Calamity on the Source, but instead brought Urianger and myself here.”

“My deepest apologies about that, by the way,” said the Exarch, “I sincerely regret any distress I have caused.”

“And this—” Y’shtola gestured at the gleaming spire, “—is the same Crystal Tower we are familiar with from the Source summoned to the First, correct?”

The Exarch nodded.

“Are you G’raha Tia?”

“I have never met anyone by that name,” said the Exarch.

Y’shtola hadn’t been present for the expedition into the Crystal Tower, but Rinh had written up detailed reports, which they had discussed at length. The Exarch spoke like a Sharlayan, smelled like a miqo’te, was of a height and build matched Rinh’s description of G’raha, and demonstrated a mastery over the Crystal Tower that could only be exercised by one with the Royal Eye. The idea that there were two such individuals was patently absurd.

Y’shtola chose not to press the issue, however. Instead, she silently took note of the fact that, under scrutiny, he had more or less immediately resorted to bald-faced lies.

***

Y’shtola’s temporary lodgings— a suite at the Catenaries— were commodious enough, but she still felt ill-at-ease. Everything about this place felt  _ wrong.  _ The architecture itself— like in the rest of this “Crystarium”— while pleasant, well-built, and airy, was deeply unfamiliar, not corresponding to any culture she was familiar with, ancient or modern, save for a handful of ornamental flourishes presumably inspired by the Crystal Tower itself. Otherwise, it was all an alien combination of utilitarian exposed brick, industrial ironworks, spiraling staircases, and high crystal domes. Everything felt too clean, compared to other cities she knew, too uniform, too regular. Cities generally had strata from which one could read their history. Limsa Lominsa slowly spread across the natural sea stacks dotting Galadion Bay to accommodate the ever-expanding maritime commerce passing through its ports. Ishgard— so dear to Rinh— was a city constantly being built and rebuilt and built again; homes for the displaced and dispossessed built after the end of the Dragonsong War and the establishment of the Republic sat atop foundations from the age of Thordan and his Knights Twelve. Even Sharlayan, which aspired to a sort of stately timelessness, had clear divides between the faux-antique and the truly ancient. Nothing in the Crystarium looked more than a few decades old— save for the Crystal Tower itself and its various outbuildings.

In any case, the strangeness of the city barely mattered compared to the sky, the sky, that bright and merciless sky. Dying aether drifted languidly through the air, stagnant and foul as any cesspool. The wind never blew, the birds never sang, water barely flowed— the sounds of a living world had all been smothered by a hollow, echoing emptiness. She had to strain herself just to sense the Lifestream; in this place, it trickled by like a babbling brook.

It hurt her to look at. It hurt her just to  _ be _ here— she’d developed a low headache within minutes of her summoning, and days later it hadn’t gone away.

This was a sickly, dying world. She had already known that, of course— she’d heard Rinh’s recounting of Ardbert’s tale of the First’s plight, and she thought of it every time her thoughts drifted to Minfilia. Now, though, she  _ felt  _ it, deep in her bones.

As she lay awake in bed, thinking of these things, she heard a soft knock on her room’s door. She glanced at her clock; it was well after midnight, even if you’d never guess if you looked out the window, or at stark shadows frozen in place for a century.

She stood up, smoothed the wrinkles out of her borrowed nightclothes, and strode over to the door to answer it.

“Good evening,” said Urianger, his expression grave. Y’shtola waved him into the room and shut the door behind him.

“I take it you’ve thoughts to share on our current predicament away from prying ears,” said Y’shtola.

“Thou hast the right of it,” said Urianger, “However, I would precede mine own thoughts with a query for thee: during thy summoning to this realm, amidst the raging waters of the rift, didst thou perchance experience… visions?”

“Of a sort,” Y’shtola said, folding her arms, “I suppose more like fragments of memory than anything else; echoes of people and places from my past.”

“Hm,” said Urianger, not meeting Y’shtola’s eyes, “I, too, was granted insight into other times and places, although not entirely as thee described. I saw… I saw a  _ future _ , which hath yet to come to pass, and must needs be averted at all costs— the Eighth Umbral Calamity.”

“The result of a Rejoining between the First and the Source, presumably.”

“Without a doubt. It was… difficult to see, and… and still more difficult to speak of, but I shall endeavor to recount it for thee…”

The tale of the Calamity told by Urianger was appalling in its every detail. Apparently, after being fought to a standstill on the Ala Mhigan frontier, a desperate Garlemald resorted to deploying Black Rose. Y’shtola was vaguely familiar with Black Rose— a potent aetherochemical weapon that was apparently too heinous for even Gaius van Baelsar, a man who thought nothing of unleashing Ultima Weapon to lay waste to Eorzea. She was under the impression that it was some sort of biological agent, but actually it worked by rendering the very aether which flowed through all living things utterly inert. When coupled with the excess Light-aspected aether overflowing into the Source from the First— already observable as the aetheric thinning Y’shtola had been studying— the results were catastrophic.  _ Millions _ were dead, vast swathes of the world were rendered uninhabitable, and civilization itself unraveled.

And every single one of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn was slain.

Given the scale of the destruction Urianger had already described, that they, too, had all died almost seemed academic. That didn’t make it any easier to hear, though. Lyse-- no longer a Scion in name, but still part of the family-- was the first to fall; she was the tip of the spear of an Alliance counteroffensive at Ghimlyt Dark, pushing the empire back until the empire decided that if they can’t have the world, no one can. But at least she got to die on her feet, at least she went down fighting. The others, Urianger said, were scythed down all at once at the Rising Stones. Tataru and Krile, Thancred and the Leveilleurs, Hoary Boulder and Coultenet and Ephemie and Alianne and all the familiar faces who’d been fixtures in her life since they’d first arrived in Mor Dhona. And Rinh, oh Rinh, her glorious aether forever becalmed, Y’shtola’s silent and clay-cold body held limply in her arms.

“Why are you only telling me about this now?” Y’shtola asked, hating how small and frail her voice sounded.

“I struggled to find the words to impart this baleful tale,” Urianger said, soft-spoken as ever but weighed down by a grief she hadn’t seen in him since they’d lost Moenbryda, “Especially given the… the particular fondness for Rinh which burneth in thine heart.”

“Urianger,” she said, “Since when have I  _ ever _ been one to flinch from an uncomfortable truth?”

“Mine apologies,” he said, bowing his head, “Given all that hath transpired, I should not have doubted thy fortitude.” Before Y’shtola could respond to that, though, he continued, as if eager to keep the conversation moving. “In any case, this prophetic vision, grim though it may be, would seem to corroborate what the Crystal Exarch hath told us thus far.”

“Agreed,” said Y’shtola, “And nothing in either tale flatly contradicts our prior knowledge of Hydaelyn’s shards, the nature of Rejoinings, or my study of the aetheric thinning I have already observed throughout the Source— although I had yet to draw any conclusions when I was torn away from our native star. Rinh, perhaps, will be able to expand upon the data I’ve left behind. Aetherology was not among her formal studies, but she has an intuitive grasp of it thanks to her multidisciplinary magical expertise.”

“Her scholarly input is one among many reasons her presence here would be dearly appreciated,” Urianger said.

The three of them always did do their best work together. Well, the four of them, really— Papalymo was the fourth member of their quartet. Sometimes, when Y’shtola, Rinh, and Urianger were poring over towering piles of tomes or batting some thorny theoretical concept back and forth, she still caught herself waiting for Papalymo’s voice, high but authoritative, to fill the silence, encouraging Urianger to be bolder in moving past the established literature, tempering some of Rinh’s wilder ideas, unspooling Y’shtola’s tangled thoughts when frustration set in and she got stuck in her own head. Even more than a year on from Baelsar’s Wall, they’d never quite settled into a new rhythm.

The thought of having to find that rhythm without Rinh, too, grieved Y’shtola. A prophecy of the future, however terrifying, was abstract in a way in a way the bare fact Rinh’s physical absence in the present was concrete.

“It’s odd that the things  _ I  _ saw in the rift were so much more jumbled than—”

“Mayhap the aetherial churn was such that it overwhelmed thine aethersight,” Urianger cut in. This was Y’shtola’s hypothesis as well, but something about how ready he was with that answer struck her as odd. It was probably nothing, though— the low headache she’d had ever since she’d first come to this world and its poisoned aether robbed her of any truly restful sleep, leaving her groggy and irritable. Like she did in the later stages of her Archon’s thesis, really, except, as the fate of two worlds and the lives of all her friends and family did not depend on the quality of a dissertation on aetherodynamics, it was perhaps  _ slightly _ lower pressure, if only because the one member of the faculty whose opinion she  _ really  _ cared about was across the sea, in the ruins of the Sharlayan colony.

“Y’shtola?” Urianger said, no doubt noticing she’d been lost in thought.

“Sorry. I’m listening.”

“For the moment, at least, I feel that any effort to effect a return to the Source is a lesser priority than seeking the salvation of two worlds.”

“Ageed,” said Y’shtola, “Returning home only to be cut down at once by Black Rose would be the very definition of a pyrrhic victory. I mislike how evasive the Exarch is on many subjects, but he  _ does _ have a vested interest in preventing an Eighth Umbral Calamity.”

“We should also seek Thancred’s counsel,” said Urianger, “He hath seen more of this star than either of us, and abided upon it longer.”

“Right. The fact he’s been here for two years when mere days elapsed on the Source points to another advantage— time, it seems, is on our side. We needn’t be concerned that the Calamity is imminent— we have time to plot out a course of action, and— when Rinh arrives— execute it.”

Which meant, of course, that from Y’shtola’s perspective, it could be a very, very long time before she saw Rinh again.

***

Her reunion with Thancred came much sooner, although it was still some months.

Y’shtola had much to occupy herself with in the meantime, however. She had the knowledge of a whole new world to absorb, from teaching herself the blocky letters of the Vrandtic script to studying deep history already nearly forgotten centuries before the Flood, from ancient grimoires of esoteria to brand-new treatises on practical magic in the midst of a widespread artherial imbalance. The Crystarium, for all its flaws, had a first-class library— without a doubt the finest remaining in Norvrandt, and indeed hosted a larger collection of volumes than she’d seen anywhere outside of Sharlayan. She could feel the weight of history in the Cabinet of Curiosities in a way she couldn’t anywhere else in the city. And Moren, the head librarian, was unfailingly courteous and helpful. Even if he did keep on trying to recommend children’s books to her, for some reason.

Y’shtola found she quite liked the  _ people  _ of the Crystarium, even if the architecture and geography of the place set her ill-at-ease. They hailed from all corners of the world, from  the fallen kingdoms of Voeburt and Nabaath Areng to the old Lakeland fiefdoms of the elves; from the husks of Kholusian villages and ports sucked dry by parasitic Eulmore to the furthest reaches of the Rak’tika Greatwood. 

There were even some who traced their roots back to nations now swallowed by the Flood of Light, the last, proud heirs to a vanished world. She heard folk songs passed down for generations from the lost western periphery of Voeburt— the land which she knew as the Dravanian Hinterlands, site of the Sharlayan colony, but simply called  _ Westland _ by its inhabitants, and those who now preserved their memory. Westland was a string of hardy villages and rustic trading posts, exchanging timber, furs, and coal for agricultural produce from the estates surrounding Voeburtenburg, which were then exported to Eulmore and Nabaath Areng. This lucrative trade built the wealth that once made Voeburtite coinage the soundest in the world, and its loss following the Flood left the rump kingdom which survived in the east a paper tiger quickly overrun by the sin eaters.

She met a viera— or a viis, rather— who told her about the mountains and highlands east of Rak’tika, which flowered into half a dozen vibrant city states when Old Ronka fell. The viis were as prodigiously long-lived as their counterparts on the Source, so the woman was able to give Y’shtola first-hand accounts of walking the streets of long-dead cities, and recite monologues from great tragic plays which once played to packed theaters, learned by heart and preserved as the last flickering embers of a culture.

She met a refined drahn dancer, poet, and singer who traced her roots back to the First’s far east. All she knew of her forebears were a few fragments passed down to her from her parents, who were themselves relying on their parents’ recollection of their childhoods-- a few dance steps. A line or two of a poem her grandmother liked. A few bars of a song. When she was a bonded citizen in Eulmore, she told Y’shtola, she often attributed her own work to these vanished ancestors to earn her keep; Eulmore’s aristocrats loved feeling like they owned something precious, something unique. In the Crystarium, however, she was writing under her own name-- writing for a posterity she had to believe will exist, in spite of all of this dying world’s contrary evidence.

The Crystarium was cosmopolitan enough, then, that Y’shtola didn’t have to worry about being conspicuous because of her exotic name or unfamiliarity with local customs, nor was she wholly dependent on the half-truth that she was “from the Exarch’s homeland.” Which wasn’t to say there weren’t misunderstandings— she had a handful of awkward conversations with mystel acquaintances informing them that no,  _ Y _ is not her given name, and eventually took to just spelling it  _ Yashtola _ when she signed her name— but they were always taken in stride.

She still never really felt comfortable, though, not really, not in the glare of that damnable Light. She supposed that the enormous crystalline domes built over many of the city’s public areas tinted and refracted the sky into something more pleasing to the eye, but that was no help to Y’shtola.

The Wandering Stairs, where she was nursing a glass of wine as she waited for Thancred, was built under one such dome. She  _ still _ had that headache; she supposed this was just what she was going to feel like for the duration of her time on the First.

She was just wondering if she should have brought along something to read when Thancred finally showed up.

The Thancred who sat down across from her was very different from the Thancred who’d collapsed at that Alliance summit in Ala Mhigo. He was clean-shaven, for one, and his hair neatly trimmed, like he was before Y’shtola invited him to take a dip in the Lifestream. Rather than giving him a boyish or youthful aspect, though, he looked severe and careworn. But then he offered Y’shtola one of his easy smiles, and the years seemed to melt away.

“Y’shtola,” he said.

“Thancred,” she said, “I thought you knew better than to keep a lady waiting.”

Thancred laughed. “I’d’ve swung by sooner, but the Eulmore-Lakeland airship is, oh, a hundred years or so late.” He glanced at the bottle of wine, but then pours himself a glass of water from the pitcher the waitress had left on their table.

“How have you been?” Y’shtola asked, “I see you’ve taken some inspiration from our dear Warrior of Light.”

“What?” asked Thancred. Y’shtola gestured at the gunblade conspicuously strapped to his back. “Oh,  _ that.  _ Right, well, in case you haven’t noticed, it’s rough out there. Sin eaters. Dangerous animals. Dangerous animals which  _ became _ sin eaters. And without Rinh around to helpfully stand directly in front of any threats, I thought it prudent to adopt a more… defensive fighting style.”

“Reasonable,” said Y’shtola, “And I presume the reason you’ve opted for this  _ particular  _ weapon is because its cartridges can be aetherically charged in advance.”

“Got it in one. Speaking of which…” Thancred pulled a pouch full of cartridges out of his coat-pocket and tossed it in Y’shtola’s direction; it landed beside her wine glass with a rattle. “I’m sure you’ve seen Rinh do this enough times to get the gist.”

“I suppose it’s only fair,” Y’shtola said, emptying out the pouch and arranging the cartridges into a neat pile, “It  _ is _ my fault you can’t channel your own aether, after all.”

“Yes, yes, I’d have  _ much _ rather been crushed flat by several tonze of rubble with my aetheric abilities intact.” Thancred’s wry grin faded into a more somber expression. “Anyroad. That day left its mark on all of us, one way or another.”

Y’shtola nodded solemnly. “It’s hard to think of a worse day in all my life.  _ Maybe  _ Rhalgr’s Reach, although I was unconscious for most of it.” She set the first cartridge in the palm of her left hand, raised her right hand over it, and began to suffuse it with aether. Seeing a trickle of her own living, free-flowing aether compact itself into the rigid structure of a magitek device was abstractly fascinating; a most striking example of microaetherodynamics.

“Does Rinh ever talk about the night of the banquet?” Thancred asked, voice uncharacteristically soft, “After the bit we saw for ourselves, I mean.”

“A little; it’s hardly a pleasant topic to dwell on.” Y’shtola set the first charged cartridge aside, and picked out another from the pile. “She… she’s told me there are long stretches of it she can barely remember. Like trying to recall a particular nightmare one had years ago, or piecing together a historical narrative from scattered and contradictory ancient documents.”

“Poor girl,” Thancred said, “When I first met her in Ul’dah,  _ years _ ago now, she said much the same about— ah, but that’s not my story to tell.”

Thancred was referring to Rinh’s gladiator days, she realized. Rinh rarely talked about them, and when she did, it tended to be scattershot details— scars attributed to this or that bout in the arena, the stage persona of a half-civilized and exotic Keeper of the Moon imposed upon her by a domineering lanista, a deep-seated loathing of almost anyone in Ul’dah who had real money to their name. The corollary to Rinh’s fervent belief that the past lives on in stories was that sometimes the past ought to be left to rot. She had the sense that Thancred had gotten Rinh out of some sort of terrible situation, first by helping her get on her feet as an adventurer, and then, once she’d made a name for herself, bringing her into the Scions. 

Y’shtola didn’t know many of the specifics of Rinh’s circumstances, but she didn’t need to; she remembered what Rinh was like when she first came into the Waking Sands, barely speaking to anyone and in a perpetual state of hyper-vigilance, looking like she was expecting a knife in the back at any moment, carefully keeping a spear’s length of space between herself and everyone else in the room.

Thancred, in short, was the reason Rinh had the chance to grow into the woman she was today and the space to spread her wings, and thank the gods for that.

“I don’t suppose she’s mentioned anything about what happened to Minfilia?” asked Thancred, cautiously. “Besides what she told all of us, I mean.”

“When I first discussed it with her, shortly after I was recovered from the Lifestream,” said Y’shtola, “I recall her saying that she felt  _ furious—  _ furious at  _ Hydaelyn.  _ At the time, the Antecedent’s abrupt departure at Hydaelyn’s beckoning when she and Rinh were so close to making it out of Ul’dah together struck Rinh as pointless and callous.”

“Did you agree with her?”

Y’shtola shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose I did, given the information I had access to at that time. The Echo— and therefore the Mother’s will itself— has ever been opaque to me. It is well outside the bounds of my scholarly expertise, so I’m reluctant to ascribe motives to Her. It’s not  _ Rinh’s  _ scholarly interest, either, so she’s also cautious about drawing conclusions, but since she has lived experience of Hydaelyn’s voice I lack, my inclination is to defer to her.”

“With the information you had at the time,” Thancred repeats, “I suppose now that we’re on the First and sitting together in a bar, rather than dying in a featureless wasteland after all the aether’s been sucked out of our empty husks, you could say the results of heeding Hydaelyn’s call rather speak for themselves, don’t they?”

“I suppose they do,” said Y’shtola.

An awkward silence fell over the table, with neither Y’shtola nor Thancred meeting the other’s eye.

“So,” Thancred said, finally, “What’s the news from home?”

“There is less than you might think,” said Y’shtola, “Riol has taken charge of the espionage operations you proposed at the conference in your stead. Urianger met Rinh, Alisae, and myself at the Rising Stones to discuss our situation. Urianger also reported that the aetheric thinning I observed in Othard was occurring in Eorzea as well.”

“What happened after that?”

“Urianger and I were summoned here,” Y’shtola said, “Thancred, less than twenty-four hours had elapsed since you were taken.”

“Wow,” said Thancred, “The Crystal Exarch told me time flows differently here, but two years to one day is a hell of a discrepancy.”

“It’s for the best, of course— this way, we needn’t worry about events on the Source spiraling out of control in our absence,” said Y’shtola, “Nor will we be compelled to rash action by a lack of time.”

“Sure,” said Thancred, “But it’s been a long two years. A long time spent on my own. I’ve kept busy, but...”

“Well,” said Y’shtola, as she finished charging yet another cartridge and set it with the others, “At least you’ll have some company, now.”

***

Her first foray outside the Crystarium, then, was alongside Thancred, accompanying him on a circuit around Lakeland to cull the local eaters. She’d learned much from her research at the Cabinet of Curiosities, of course, but she still wanted to get her feet on the ground. She’d never fully grasp this world’s plight from study alone, after all.

Lakeland, supposedly, was one of the safer parts of the First; its roads were patrolled by the Crystarium’s soldiers, with checkpoints, fortifications, and watchtowers placed at strategic points. But safety is relative— sin eaters still hunted living aether throughout the region, especially in the less built-up backcountry. And there was always the looming threat of a swarm; the Crystarium itself could raise its barriers, but the rest of Lakeland lacked this last line of defense. 

Y’shtola, therefore, deemed it prudent to make preparations. The most important, of course, was procuring a new staff for herself. When she had more time, she’d have something custom made to her own exacting specifications, but for the moment the sturdy if unexceptional ebony rod she’d bought at the Crystalline Mean would have to suffice. She also decided that the loose scholar’s robes she’d been provided with upon arrival were unsuited for the field, so she put together a new traveling outfit from things found at the Musica Universalis: a pair of high leather boots, a knee-length skirt, a riding cloak. All in black, which was hardly her color, but she felt like this place could use a little darkness.

Lakeland itself was not what she was expecting. She’d studied its history, she’d seen maps, she saw engravings of elven ruins in their pre-Flood splendor— but the image in her mind’s eye was some sort of wasteland. Instead, it was in many ways more intact than Mor Dhona. This was a place that had never been torn asunder by successive calamities, never played host to anything like the Battle of Lake Silvertear. The earth beneath her feet was not pincushioned with crystals, no shards of Dalamud pierced the landscape, the waters of the Source ran fresh and clear, teeming with fish. Trees with violet leaves were thriving. Amid the tumbledown majesty of the elven ruins, new settlements had grown— military installations, yes, but also villages of farmers and fishers, market-towns, even some hot springs.

There was life here; there was  _ beauty. _

But above it all, that terrible sky still blazed; the air was still stale, the wind dead, the aether stagnant. Lakeland’s beauty was as a butterfly in amber.

And lurking horrors abounded.

The first sin eater Y’shtola ever saw was a frail little thing, with long, ungainly limbs and a pair of scrawny wings which looked quite insufficient to keep the creature aloft. It almost just looked pathetic, but it was filled to bursting with putrid aether. It took but a single stroke of Thancred’s gunblade to fell the wretched thing; Y’shtola hadn’t even finished raising her staff yet.

It lay there in the dirt for a few moments before its body burst into a haze of Light, which quickly dispersed.

“One of the lesser sin eaters, I presume,” Y’shtola said, carefully studying the fluctuating levels of ambient aether caused by the sin eater’s sudden arrival and still more sudden demise.

“Right,” said Thancred, “The little ones can’t do much harm on their own; they’re no more dangerous than, say, a particularly ravenous wild animal. When stronger eaters are on the move, though, these buggers  _ swarm, _ and  _ then _ you’ve got problems.”

“I suspect even a single sin eater of any size might pose a significant danger to any travelers less heavily armed than ourselves.”

“Hence the need to hunt ‘em.” Thancred shrugged. “Even so, at least these ones can’t turn you. If that sort of eater gets you, at  _ worst _ you’re just dead. There are things a lot worse than dying.”

“If it’s all the same, I’d prefer if neither of us died,” said Y’shtola. She takes one last look around the area; the last remnants of the sin eater’s aether were now so diffuse as to be imperceptible. “We should keep moving.”

The second sin eater she saw came in the night.

Or in what passed for night in these parts, anyway. 

They had made camp after a long day of uneventful travel. Thancred volunteered to take first watch while Y’shtola slept. He circled the perimeter of the camp, weapon at the ready, while Y’shtola was in the tent, curled up in a bedroll, and wide awake.

Her suite at the Catenaries was equipped for this situation— like most buildings in the Crystarium, every window had shutters and a thick blackout curtain. Even then, she still often had trouble getting to sleep. With nothing between her and that bright and awful sky but a canvas tent, trying to fall asleep felt like a losing battle.

She wondered what Rinh would make of all of this; if nothing else, at least Rinh was used to slumbering even when it’s bright as day outside.

But if Rinh had gotten used to sleeping at night and being up and about in the daylight after years spent doing it the other way around, then surely—  _ surely—  _ it was possible for Y’shtola to get used to this.

For the moment, though, she admitted defeat, and slipped out of the tent.

“Can’t sleep?” said Thancred, looking at her over his shoulder.

Y’shtola opened her mouth to speak, but before she could say a word, a terrible shadow swept across the camp. She raised her staff, looking up, as Thancred took up position before her in a defensive stance.

An avenging angel hung sickeningly in the sky, wings of pure radiance fanning out from its back and a sword of fire in its hands. The expression on its alabaster face was one of blank perfection, but its eyes revealed nothing but a bottomless hunger. All around Y’shtola, aether shuddered and quaked, as if the very fundaments of life were shaken by mere proximity.

Thancred chambered a round in his gunblade. “If you knock it out of the sky, I’ll finish it off!”

“Right!” answered Y’shtola, already weaving wind-aspected aether around her staff. She spun it into a raging tempest, which she sent careening towards the sin eater.

In the hands of a conjurer as talented as herself, Aero could be as dangerous as any fireball or bolt of lightning. She’d seen it strip the armor plating right off of war machina, send whole formations of soldiers flying at fatal velocities, and level entire gun emplacements.

The sin eater couldn’t shrug off this attack; buffeted by these preternatural winds, it was knocked badly off-balance and went into a tailspin. Its physical form endured perfectly intact, however; Y’shtola had hoped it would have shattered into a cloud of aether right then and there. Oh well.

In any case, it didn’t stay intact for long— the instant it hit the ground, Thancred was upon it. He pierced the thing’s carapace with a downward thrust of his blade and pulled the trigger; the sharp report of a magitek round echoed across the woods. For a moment, Y’shtola thought the fight was over— and then, in a sudden, violent movement, the sin eater spreads its wings, knocking Thancred out of the way.

_ “Shite,” _ hissed Thancred. He managed to keep his footing— what could have been a fall became merely a skid— but the eater had still cleared a path between itself and Y’shtola. It began to rise into the sky again, the tip of its burning blade pointed right at Y’shtola.

So she dropped a giant boulder on its head.

The local aether was already jolted out of balance by the sin eater’s disruptive presence; earth-aspected aether was practically seeping out of the ground. It was child’s play, then, to tilt the aether she wove around her staff towards this aspect, condense it into stone, and send it sailing towards the foe.

The boulder hit the ground. Nothing was left of the sin eater but a few dying sparks of light.

“Hm,” said Y’shtola.

“‘Hm’ what?” said Thancred, who’d composed himself by this point.

“Ambient levels of Light aether in the vicinity have dropped precipitously. Lower, even, than I noticed before its arrival. Curious…”

“Is that something we can use?”

“I don’t know,” Y’shtola says, “Not yet. The Light might have merely dispersed in such a way that a sort of aetheric vacuum was left, in which case the overall aetheric imbalance of the First diminishes not one whit. On the other hand, if that aether is de-aspected or lost— or even just a portion of it bled off via aetheric entropy— it suggests that the destruction of a sin eater removed Light from the system. A negligible amount from a single eater, perhaps, and tracking down every individual sin eater and killing it is an impractical plan, but it still could point the way towards a more actionable vector of attack. Either way, I need more data.”

“Well, it’s promising, at least,” said Thancred, rubbing the back of his neck, “I think. Aetherology isn’t my field, so I’ll take your word for it.”

“Also,” Y’shtola said, “I should probably expand my repertoire of offensive spells. When the most dangerous beings on this star inflict wounds no healing magic can salve, thaumaturgy might serve me better than conjury.”

***

The next day of travel passed without incident, which was fortunate— Y’shtola never did get to sleep the prior night, and so she was operating at something less than her full capabilities. She’d also yet to recover all of the aether she’d expended fighting the eater— another practical limitation of conjury, in these circumstances.

When the two Scions arrived at the village of Holminster Switch, the stately clock tower adorning its town hall indicated it was the early evening. She supposed she’d have to trust it; the golden sky was pitiless and eternal as ever.

Despite being lit so unwholesomely, though, something of Holmister’s charm shone through. It was a quaint farming community, containing many excellently preserved pre-Flood buildings. A few of them even had ornamentation with motifs associated with the old Church of the Light— cornices emblazoned with solar rays, and the like.

The village inn was homey, inviting, and featured heavily shuttered windows. As she and Thancred tucked into their dinner— shepherd’s pie and a hearty stew— she could almost believe this was somewhere back home.

“So,” said Thancred, “Got any plans for what you’ll be doing while we wait for the Exarch to finally bring Rinh over?”

“Only broadly,” said Y’shtola, “I’m still finding my footing here, after all. That said, I expect to mostly be occupied with research. We need as keen an understanding of this world as possible, both to be as prepared as possible for when Rinh is summoned, and to explore alternative avenues in the event the Crystal Exarch’s high hopes of summoning the Warrior of Light fail to materialize.”

“I might have something on that, actually. Do you know much about Eulmore, Y’shtola?”

Y’shtola shook her head. “Pre-Flood, it— like its Limsa Lominsan counterpart— was Norvrandt’s premier maritime power. Post-Flood, I know only that its ruling class reminds me of Rinh’s accounts of Ul’dah’s elite, and that it is unlikely to be of any assistance in an attempt to challenge the First’s status quo, however objectively unfavorable that status quo might be.”

Thancred grinned, steepling his fingers. “Correct on all counts, which is why I expect getting in and out of the city to be a bit of an undertaking. I’ve got to, though— they’re keeping  _ Minfilia  _ there.”

For a moment, Y’shtola believed, her knowledge of the Oracle of Light’s arrival a century ago and the present Vrandtic notion of  _ Minfilia  _ as a sort of title notwithstanding. Hearing the name from Thancred’s lips, hearing the conviction in his voice, she can imagine the Minfilia she’d known, the Minfilia she’d lost on the night of the bloody banquet, was out there somewhere.

That wasn’t how these things worked, though. “You refer, of course, to the  _ current  _ Minfilia.”

“Yes, of course,” said Thancred, “But since the girl’s inherited our Minfilia’s blessings, surely she’s in there,  _ somewhere.” _

Y’shtola frowned. “Hm.” 

***

Once again, Y’shtola lay awake in bed, the more commodious accommodations afforded by the inn notwithstanding. She closed her eyes, more out of habit than anything else—her eyelids might block light, but did little to mitigate Light.

For want of something else to occupy her restless mind, she thought through what she knew of this world’s aetherology. Umbral Light and Astral Dark— Rinh, always skeptical of the political and cultural values assigned to lightness and darkness, would get a kick out of that. No wonder Arbert and his comrades presented themselves as Warriors of Darkness when they came to the Source. Even if in their time the notion of the Warrior of Darkness as some sort of psychopomp figure who shepherded lost souls to the Sunless Sea hadn’t taken root, they probably still grasped the title’s double meaning in a way none native to the Source could.

She missed the dark.

She missed the darkness of the night sky— although the last time she’d seen the stars was that night in Ul’dah, on a balcony with Thancred as he tried to prod her into asking Rinh to dance and made fun of her favorite shoes, she’d gotten used to the sight that instead greeted her when she looked up. That slate-black, empty void threw the natural aether of the world below into sharp relief. The beauty of the stars had been taken from her, but in its place was a strange new beauty, an aurora of aether dancing in time with the world’s heartbeat.

She missed the darkness of the night sky, of long shadows cast while the sun hung low over the horizon, of the sea on an overcast day. 

The darkness under the sheltering boughs of trees— the deep woods, where Wailers feared to tread and Keepers lived free.

Rinh’s sable hair. That black lipstick she always wore. Her brown skin, with its constellations of freckles and nebulae of scar tissue.

Her very own Warrior of Darkness…

Y’shtola’s wandering thoughts faded into dreams. She slept soundly that night.

* * *

**Rinh**

The forward operating base was much closer to the Ghimlyt frontlines than the fortified headquarters set up in the rear; Rinh had been assured that it was still out of range of the Garlean artillery, but it was connected to sectors that  _ were  _ under bombardment by communications trenches, so the fighting still felt close at hand. Every few minutes, the Alliance’s guns— the berthas, repurposed dragonkillers, and Maelstrom cannons dragged off the decks of ships that had seen service in the siege of Ala Mhigo having long since given way to more modern quick firing 18-ponzers, ack-acks, heavy antimachina guns, and the like— thundered as they fired off a volley; the low, deep rumbling in the distance was the imperial counterbarrage.

So while Rinh had to admit that there were places more dangerous for Lyse to have set up shop, the forward base still didn’t seem  _ particularly  _ safe. The Garleans hadn’t made another push since the Alliance and its eastern allies turned back the offensive launched after their “parley” with Varis zos Galvus, but it was easy to imagine a later effort pushing the Alliance back enough to leave this particular trench open to bombardment.

When she stepped into Lyse’s dugout, the Resistance commander was hunched over a radio set. For a moment—

—just a moment—

Rinh expects the static to resolve itself into a song.

Then she heard M’naago’s voice, though, which made far more sense when she thought about it. “You were right about the raid on grid sixty-six just being a feint,” she said, audible even through heavy interference, “So we were ready for ‘em when the hammer fell further down the line; the Garleans walked right into enfilade fire at grid twenty-one, which sorted them out right quick. No casualties.”

“Great news,” said Lyse, “But keep an eye out, okay? It might’ve just been them feeling our defenses out. Conscripts’ lives are cheap to the empire, so I wouldn’t put it past them to get their own guys killed just so the scholae know what to expect in the ‘real’ attack.”

The radio fell silent. Then and only then did Lyse turn around to look at Rinh, offering her a tired, sad smile. “Rinh,” she said.

“Lyse,” said Rinh, “You’re not wearing Yda’s dress?”

“Yeah, well,” Lyse, clad in simple Resistance fatigues, gestured around her— at the timber-braced earthen walls of the dugout, the barbed wire curling above it on the trench’s lip, the roiling darkness above lit only by sporadic tracer fire, “I thought maybe she  _ wouldn’t  _ want to be a part of all this.”

“Suppose it’s not exactly Liberation Day out there, huh?”

“Guess not,” said Lyse, “Hey, is there any, uh… news from the Rising Stones?”

“No,” said Rinh, “There’s been no change in anyone’s condition. Not for the worse, not for the better. Thancred, Urianger, Shtola, Alphinaud, Alisaie— they’re all still… wherever they’ve gone.”

_ “Fuck,”  _ mumbled Lyse.

“So I suppose I’m the last one left, then,” Rinh murmured, looking down at her feet; the hem of her white mage’s robe was already stained with dirt and mud even though she’d only just arrived in the trenchworks. Her skill as a healer was more in demand of late than her blade or her shield; she tended to the wounded behind the frontlines, and to the Scions’ slumbering bodies at Dawn’s Respite. “The last one who hasn’t had my soul yanked away to gods-know-where by… by whatever’s targeting us.”

Someone else might have responded with some inspirational platitude, or— more usefully— some sort of appeal to pragmatism. Lyse did neither of those things; what she did say, she said without any words at all, taking Rinh’s trembling hands in hers and softly kissing her knuckles one-by-one. Rinh looked up at Lyse, taking a deep breath, and then another, and then another.

“It— it seems pretty inevitable that it’s going to get me, too,” Rinh said. Her brows were still knit with worry, but her voice is more even than it was a moment ago. “I’ve been trying to— you know— get things in order.”

“Rinh…”

“So many people want so many things from me— or from the Warrior of Light, rather— and I know so, so much depends on me, but sometimes I feel like I can barely keep up. Especially now, with Garlemald at the gates and so many of us already gone. And— and if I can’t—” Rinh’s voice caught in her throat; she could tell she was on the edge of tears, but pressed on. “If I can’t be the Warrior of Light the world expects me to be, if I can’t bear that weight anymore—” She sniffled, the first few teardrops already rolling down her cheeks. “If— if I leave someone else to be crushed by this burden, if someone else has to contort and bend and break themself into the Warrior of Light, because I couldn’t— I can’t— I—”

“Rinh,” Lyse repeated, softly, “Everything’s going to be okay.” She squeezed Rinh’s hands.

“You— you don’t know that,” murmured Rinh, trying to stifle a sob, burying her face in Lyse’s jacket.

Lyse let go of Rinh’s hands, but only to pull her into a proper hug. “Look, I can’t say I get all of this stuff with souls, but Krile and Matoya figured out that nobody’s soul’s dissipated, so they must be  _ somewhere.” _

Rinh nodded weakly.

“So if it happens to you, too, you’ll be wherever they are.”

“Yeah...”

“And with you  _ and  _ Shtola around,” said Lyse, “I’m sure you’d make short work of whatever the problem is and bring all those souls home.”

And she smiled so brightly that Rinh couldn’t help but meet it with a small smile of her own.

***

Rinh made the rounds in Dawn’s Respite, checking on each Scion as Krile got some much-needed sleep. No one’s condition had improved, but no one’s had deteriorated, either, and in times like these, she was prepared to take good news where she could get it.

Satisfied that no one was in need of her immediate attention, she sank into the chair in what was quickly becoming her customary spot at Y’shtola’s bedside.

Y’shtola, steadily breathing through parted lips, really did look like she was just asleep. It was so easy for Rinh to believe that if she reached out and shook Y’shtola, her eyes would flutter open, a sleepy smile on her face— or, possibly, a withering look for rousing her without good reason— and she’d be back. Her Y’shtola, just like that.

But when Rinh holds Y’shtola’s hand, although her skin is soft and warm to the touch, her muscles relaxed, and her pulse beating at regular intervals, she does not stir. Wherever Y’shtola was, it’s not here.

“I’ll see you soon,” whispered Rinh, “Promise.”


	10. the deep woods

**Y’shtola**

Taking an amaro to Rak’tika was, perhaps, a mistake. The Crystal Exarch had offered her speedy conveyance to the Greatwood when she declared her intention to plumb the secrets of Old Ronka, and she had accepted. She wondered if he still would have offered up a prize amaro to Y’shtola if he knew she had no intention of returning to the Crystarium until she received word of Rinh’s arrival— but he didn’t know. G’raha Tia wasn’t the only one who could traffic in secrets and half-truths.

Still, she thought, clinging to her amaro, perhaps she should have just taken the time to get to the forest on foot, or on chocoboback. It wasn’t that she had any particular aversion to flying— one cannot spend as much time with the Warrior of Light as she had without taking to the sky on a bewildering variety of creatures, magical contrivances, and strange contraptions. She’d ridden on yols, on giant falcons, in a manacutter whose sails rattled alarmingly in the umbral winds of the Churning Mists, in the passenger seat of some sort of absurd Ironworks prototype of a four-wheeled ground vehicle that could fold out into a small airship. She’d ridden on  _ Midgarsormr,  _ for gods’ sake.

Nor did she have any particular misgivings about her present mount. The bird— whose name, apparently, was Vanilla Tart— was strong-backed and indefatigable, but possessed of a sweet temperament that reminded her of Rinh’s chocobo, Sports. (“The hazards of letting your then-five year old son pick out a name for the Grand Company bird the Maelstrom sent us,” Rinh had said, laughing.)

The problem— as it ever was on the First— was that damnable sky.

Even on the Source, she often had difficulty discerning things on the ground from high up; aether did not travel as light did, nor with as much clarity; everything but the most powerful enchantments seemed dim and indistinct when seen at bird’s eye. Cities were dull shadows, forests a hazy fog, people nothing but faint sparks.

The Light’s glare obliterated all of these faint vestiges. All around her, in every direction, all she could see was that awful sky.

Vanilla Tart, close at hand and full of living aether, might as well have been the only thing that existed on the whole reflection. So she held the amaro tightly, burying her face in its fur, trusting it to reach her destination.

***

She landed just at the edge of the swamp of Citia. This, she had read, was one of the sparser and therefore more settled parts of the Greatwood.  _ Sparse _ was a relative term in places like this, though; it was still more life in one place than she’d seen anywhere else on the First. Sparse in the way that Rinh meant when she said she grew up “where the Shroud started to thin out.”

Y’shtola patted Vanilla Tart on the nose and offered it a carrot; pleased by the treat, the amaro ate it right out of her hand. Its duty discharged and payment rendered, it took wing again, flying westward, back to Lakeland.

She, on the other hand, set off to the northeast, down the road to Fort Gohn. As she walked, she took in her surroundings, trying to get a sense of the lay of the land. In spite of the beauty around her, this still was the First. It was still stiflingly quiet; no breeze rustled the leaves, no birds called to one another from bough to bough. The air was still thick with stagnant aether.

And yet…

And yet, when Y’shtola chanced to glance upwards, she saw more than just an endless expanse of Light. Living aether flowed this way and that, weaving through the wretched sky, sheltering her from the glare of a dying star.

The canopy, she realized; she was looking at the forest canopy. Living trees and their haphazard growth shielded her from the Light far more effectively than any amount of glass-and-steel artifice at the Crystarium.

She took a deep breath, feeling more clear-headed than she had in  _ months.  _ The headache she’d had since arriving on the First was clearing up, she realized.

She had a good feeling about this place.

***

Y’shtola heard the Night’s Blessed before she saw them; a rustle of leaves, a scent on the wind, and then a voice calling out:  _ “Allin tuta?” _

She was being addressed in  _ Ronkan,  _ she realized. It had taken her a moment to recognize it— the pronunciation was different from what she’d gleaned from her studies. This wasn’t Ronkan, the ancient language dutifully preserved by scholars like a lepidopterist’s prize specimen. It was Ronkan, a living language, still growing and changing centuries after the empire fell.

_ “Allin chi’si!” _ she called in response, in her dry scholar’s Ronkan.

Two people stepped out of the long shadows cast by trees. The first was a tall elven woman— a Duskwight, in Eorzean terms, although such distinctions meant nothing in Norvrandt— conspicuously holding a bow, lowered now but likely pointed right at Y’shtola mere moments ago. The second was a ronso man, massive, powerfully built, yet clearly of mild temperament.

“What can the Night’s Blessed do for you, traveler?” said the ronso, a gentle smile on his face.

The elf eyed her suspiciously. “You were coming from Lakeland, but you don’t look much like a trader.”

“I am a scholar,” Y’shtola said, “I have come to seek the wisdom of Ronka, and refuge from the Light.”

“By what name are you called?” asked the ronso.

_ This _ Y’shtola expected— details of the Night’s Blessed culture were hard to come by in the Crystarium, but even the traders who occasionally plied these roads knew about their customs around names. True names were too sacred to be profaned by the Light.

“You may call me Matoya,” said Y’shtola.

The ronso grinned. “And you may call  _ me _ Runar. Now, come, come— Fort Gohn is just down the road.”

***

Fort Gohn was larger than Y’shtola expected; it had walls and a watchtower offering a commanding view of the surrounding area, but in most respects it looked more like a small village than a fortress. Runar led her through the gate and past simple but sturdy wooden structures, eventually ushering her into the darkened inner sanctum of a small temple. At its center sat a basin of water, glittering with reflected candlelight and a fine dusting of aether.

“Usually, when someone new comes to our little community, we have a little ritual to welcome them,” said Runar.

“To cleanse the Light’s taint, I presume?” said Y’shtola.

“You’ve done your research, then,” said Runar, with an approving smile, “Then again, I’d expect no less from a scholar of Ronkan wisdom.”

Earlier in her life, Y’shtola saw little use for ritual. Sharlayan rationality looked down its nose at such things, although, like all Sharlayan virtues, it was shot through with hypocrisy: a contempt for the superstitions of others even as Sharlayan life was rife with ponderous ceremonies— convocations of the Forum, graduations at the Studium, the announcement of prestigious academic appointments, debates over which deceased sages were deserving of commemoration on the Cenotaph— such things set the rhythm of the Sharlayan civic religion. There were spells that involved some degree of ritual to invoke, of course— to deny this would be to deny the empirical realities of magic— but practitioners were advised to consider them dispassionately as just another spellcasting tool, of no more ideological character than a conjurer’s branch or a thaumaturge’s scepter.

Her attitude softened when she came to Eorzea— or, rather, when she came into direct contact with the Empire. It was easy to see how Garlean attitudes were a dark mirror of Sharlayan’s— an arbitrary conception of objective reality and contempt for everyone and everything outside its bounds. The Sharlayans might merely tut in disapproval at what the Garleans would crush underfoot, but ultimately both could be traced to a similar set of assumptions: the world split into  _ us  _ and  _ them,  _ with the superiority of  _ us _ over the primitive other taken for granted.

And then, she met Rinh, and her feelings on the matter became still more complicated. Rinh was, of course, a superb scholar with a keen intellect and a comprehensive depth and breadth of knowledge. She could hold her own against any archon— in other circumstances, she could have easily become an archon herself. She, in short, knew how the world really worked.

Yet there was the conviction of true belief behind it when she left offerings for the dead, when she told stories of the family ghosts, when she sought counsel from her ancestors. To Y’shtola, so steeped in Sharlayan rationality, it seemed as if the Keeper of the Moon somehow held two different, contradictory versions of the world in her head. But to Rinh, this was no contradiction at all; it was simply two ways of seeing the world, which she moved between as easily as she slipped between Huntspeak and the common tongue. 

And so, even after everything her family had endured— the scorn of Gridanians, the encroachments of the Galeans, the persecution by Wood Wailer hands, the Calamity— there was still an unbroken thread connecting herself to her forebears. Rinh was teaching her son the stories and songs she was taught by her mother and aunt, who were taught by their mother, who was taught by  _ her  _ mother, and on and on, across generations of Panipahr women, through wars and plagues and Calamities. Through the Sundering itself, perhaps— some Sharlayan linguists had proposed that some Keeper of the Moon family names predated the First Astral Era.

Y’shtola knelt before the basin, and Runar carefully sprinkled her with water. The water possessed no substantial aetherial qualities— it was slightly more rich with aether than average, imbued as it was with the crystallized intent of generations of priests, but such trace amounts of aether were quite insufficient to affect the water’s overall aetherial balance or grant it magical properties.

But the connection she felt to the Night’s Blessed was nonetheless concrete.

***

Over the next few months, Y’shtola spent far more time learning about the Night’s Blessed than about the ancient Ronkans. Not that these were mutually exclusive, of course— Ronkan language, culture, and beliefs were all woven into the fabric of daily life among the Blessed. For more conventional research, the Blessed’s priests maintained a respectable collection of tomes— perhaps not as exhaustive as the Cabinet of Curiosities’ towering stacks, but considerably more esoteric, which suited Y’shtola. The only way she’d make any headway unraveling the secrets of Ronka was to come at them sideways, after all. She’d also made some cursory surveys of the Ronkan ruins situated near Fort Gohn, although, with many of them submerged, her observations were limited by how long she could hold her breath until Rinh or Alisaie came along.

Some of what she learned about the Night’s Blessed themselves was through similarly traditional means— the priests were not merely keepers of ancient lore, but authors of modern texts— histories, religious texts, genealogies— all could be studied and cross-referenced with books she’d read in the Crystarium, filling in more of the gaps in her imperfect understanding of Norvrandt.

But the most important lessons about the Night’s Blessed were taught simply by continuing to live and work alongside them. Every day she spent tending to the crops of the village’s humble commons, every heartstone she saw consigned to the Sunless Sea, every broken bone set, every sin eater she slew— each of them was another thread tying her fate to the Blessed’s.

“Master Matoya,” said Runar, preceded by the sound of his surprisingly soft footsteps, “Theowren would like a word with you, if that’s all right.”

Y’shtola closed the book she was reading and stood up. Runar led her back to the humble temple where, all those months ago, she’d been cleansed of the Light by the Blessed’s sacred waters, where Theowren— or the drahn woman Y’shtola knew as “Theowren”, anyway— was waiting for her. Theowren was one of the Night’s Blessed’s most venerable priests; although the Blessed had little use for formal hierarchies, the oldest and and most learned of their clergy tended to lead the community through sheer force of gravitas. Yet this deference didn’t make Theowren cold or imperious— it was clear that she was possessed not only of a bottomless compassion for the Night’s Blessed, but also a palpable sense of joy at all they’d accomplished together— surviving and thriving in spite of everything this dying world had thrown at them.

Rinh had often described her Aunt Sizha in similarly terms— wise, nurturing, proud of her people, and stubbornly defiant of the marginal circumstances they were forced to subsist in through cruel circumstance.

But then, a lot of things about the Night’s Blessed reminded her of Rinh, Rinh and her stories of home, family, and the deep woods.

_ “Allin tuta,  _ Matoya,” said Theowren.

_ “Allin chi’si,” _ replied Y’shtola, with an accent somewhere between the reconstructed Ronkan she’d studied and the living Ronka she’d picked up from her time amongst the Blessed. “I hope I’m not in trouble, Master Theowren,” she added, a wry smile on her face.

Theowren laughs. “Quite the opposite, in fact. The other priests and I have been conferring with the community, and we’ve decided it’s past time we recognized you as one of us. Runar, if you’d be so kind…”

With a flourish, Runar handed Y’shtola a small package wrapped in cloth. She unwrapped it carefully and reverently, revealing a small, pristine gemstone. It was alive with aether— a jeweler’s sharpened internet behind its cut facets, imbued with the subtle tinge of ritual belief.

Y’shtola recognized what it was at once. “A heartstone,” she said, awe in her voice.

“We decided to use amethyst for it,” Runar said, “The purple matches the stone set in that new staff you’ve been working on, so I thought— sorry, I’m just babbling.”

“I—” said Y’shtola, “I don’t know what to say. Or how to repay you for this honor”

Theowren smiled, the crow’s feet at the corners of her eyes crinkling. “Your presence in our community is recompense enough.”

“Thank you,” said Y’shtola.

“I would ask a small favor of you, however,” added Theowren.

“Of course,” answered Y’shtola.

“Tell me again how it was to behold the Sunless Sea.”

***

“Have there been any new developments since last we spoke?” asked Y’shtola.

“Nay,” said Urianger, “However, I come bearing some few of the volumes thou hast sought; the Bookman’s Shelves hath availed me of myriad tomes absent from the Crystarium’s collection.” He handed Y’shtola a rucksack; when she peered inside, she saw the baroque typography of the Kingdom of Voeburt at its height. Satisfied, she closed the bag and slung it over her shoulder.

The Urianger who stood before her was much changed from the one she’d left behind at the Crystarium. He had already abandoned the hood and goggles he habitually wore back home, but by now he had also stopped hiding himself behind shapeless robes. The sleeveless chiton he wore— in addition to making him look like an allegorical figure from a Sharlayan monument— revealed a figure that was fit and trim. He was draped with golden jewelry and fine chains radiating starry aether, betokening not only his newfound interest in astrology and divination, but also a hitherto unknown willingness to accessorize.

Then again, she supposed she looked rather different, too. She’d done some accessorizing of her own, for one thing— she’d had the amethyst heartstone set in an ornate silver brooch dangling from a choker, and like many of the Night’s Blessed— and Keepers of the Moon, for that matter— she’d taken to decorating her hair with feathers. The black robes she’d arrived with had been so heavily modified over the past year that just about the only thing left unchanged was the color. The bodice had been taken in, the skirts augmented filled out with layers of ruffles, and it was decorated with typically Night’s Blessed ornamental elements— fur lining, zigzagging lacing, a low neckline. The ensemble was rounded out, of course, by a pair of handmade, perfectly-fitted, leyline-imbued leather boots— by far the finest footwear she’d owned to date.

She was doing more than just trying to fit in, if she was being honest with herself— her favored outfits tended to have a flair for the dramatic that she could only describe as  _ Panipahrian.  _ She understood, now, why Rinh found such pleasure in this method of expressing herself. It was a means of choosing how to present herself to the world, a medium of communication as freighted with meaning as speech.

She missed Rinh. Her heart still ached for her every day. But the reminders of Rinh all around her— this forest, these people, this new home of hers— were a source of comfort rather than pain. Remembering is hard, Rinh had often said, but forgetting is worse. And so, as she walked this path, the Warrior of Light still guided her every step.

“I must say,” Urianger said, “Thou hast taken to thy new surroundings well, and carry thyself with an ease I seldom saw from thee even on our native star.”

Y’shtola smiled. “I suppose that given my upbringing and my tastes in romance, it was only a matter of time before I became some sort of reclusive forest witch.”

***

Nighttime. Y’shtola’s hosts were well aware of the drawbacks of her particular way of seeing the world, and so provided her with a living space in a sturdy stone cellar. When she lay in bed, she could almost imagine it was actually dark out. She’d been sleeping better, lately, although still irregularly— her circadian rhythm still hadn’t adapted to this place without darkness, no moon in the sky, no sun sinking beneath the horizon.

She wondered what Rinh would think of her little hidey-hole. Would it remind her of Gelmorran tunnels? The passages beneath Baelsar’s Wall? Or would she just think of the perfectly ordinary basement this place actually looked like? She’d take the lack of lighting down there in stride, anyway— she was a Keeper of the Moon, after all. Perhaps, like Y’shtola, she’d even find it a relief after time spent beneath the First’s burning skies. She didn’t have Y’shtola’s sensitivity to aether, but she was much more sensitive to ordinary sunlight than Y’shtola had been when she’d still seen the world through her eyes.

Certainly, she could see Rinh feeling at home here, among all these cluttered books and papers. It was easy to imagine Rinh’s things here, mingled with Y’shtola’s, like they had in Rinh’s bedroom at Fortemps Manor, in Y’shtola’s chambers at the Rising Stones.

It was easier still to imagine Rinh lying alongside her, curled up in Y’shtola’s embrace, a bare shoulder peeking out from under the covers, black hair spilling onto the pillow. 

Y’shtola’s hand drifted downwards, between her legs, and she thought of Rinh’s hands, small but not delicate, scarred and calloused and strong. She imagined how those hands felt inside her, curling against her inner walls, gentle but decisive. The way Rinh’s skin felt pressed against hers. The way she looked as she came undone beneath Y’shtola, eyes half-lidded, lips parted to reveal fangs, cheeks flushed, hair plastered to her forehead with sweat.

Y’shtola came gasping Rinh’s name.

Her last thought before drifting away into a contented sleep was a profound relief that the building above her cellar was a storehouse rather than someone’s home.

***

Some hours later, Y’shtola woke with a start. The constant dull throb of the Light had sharpened suddenly. Something unsettled was in the air. By the time she’d gotten dressed, wrapped herself in a cloak, taken up Nightseeker, and ascended the narrow stairway up to Fort Gohn’s courtyard, the sensation was almost painful.

_ Sin eaters,  _ she realized,  _ sin eaters were bearing down on the village. _

The Night’s Blessed had clearly already sensed that  _ something _ was amiss; the able-bodied adults were arming themselves with bows, spears, and staves. Others were running to and fro, knocking on doors, trying to make sure no one was caught asleep. In the center of town, the priests-- Theowren among them-- were gathered in a circle, coordinating the flurry of activity. Urianger stood a few paces behind them, clearly intent on helping somehow but without a clear task.

_ “Matoya!” _ shouted Theowren, as she caught sight of Y’shtola.

“Sin eaters are on their way here,” Y’shtola said, catching her breath.

“As I suspected!” answered Theowren, “Take your friend over there--” she indicated Urianger with a jerk of her chin, “--go up the watchtower, and see if you can get some specifics about what we’re dealing with! We’ll keep getting ready for an attack as best we can in the meantime.”

With a nod, Y’shtola dashed to the tower, Urianger in tow. Together, they climbed the rickety wooden stairs, up through the forest canopy, to the tower’s apex. The higher they got, the more focused Y’shtola’s perception of massing Light became.

Finally, they had the right vantage point for Y’shtola to sense the sin eaters precisely, without the teeming, living aether of the Greatwood itself masking their approach. There were fewer eaters than Y’shtola expected— which was actually a bad sign, because if sin eaters so few in number were capable of causing such an aetherial surge, they must be  _ truly  _ formidable. And by far the brightest Light, shining like a terrible beacon, belonged to an eater scarcely larger than a hyur or a miqo’te.

She recognized it, she realized. She recognized it from the illustrations in those children’s books Moren was so enamoured with. The Mystic Knight Eudoxia, the famous Spellblade of the North, equally skilled with spell and sword, respected for her counsel, dreaded on the battlefield. Something like a Red Mage, Y’shtola supposed, hailing from the chilly northern continent which, on the Source, played a far more infamous role as the cradle of the Garlean Empire. In its hands it clutched what was clearly Ragnarok, Eudoxia’s sword, a gift from King Lue-Rhei after she saved his life, depicted in many a tome detailing artifacts of arcane power.

But she recognized the it from somewhere else, too, from a far more recent source-- the pamphlets and posters that circulated at the Crystarium warning of particularly dangerous sin eaters. Nothing was left of wise old Eudoxia save an empty form and raw aetheric power-- the thing delineated in burning aether before her, held aloft by stone wings, covered in veins of gold which converged into talons, was Forgiven Vengeance.

Forgiven Vengeance raised Ragnarok high into the air, fire-aspected aether rippling through its blade.

And then, abruptly, the world burst into flames. Fire rained from the sky, and everything in its path— the trees, the underbrush, the wooden walls of Fort Gohn— was set ablaze like so much kindling.

Something about the scene before her, she realizes, was oddly, sickeningly familiar. The day of the Calamity, perhaps? But that couldn’t be it-- she’d been in Limsa Lominsa then, and though fire rained from the sky, the city’s stone buildings were battered and smashed but never caught fire. Rinh’s descriptions of her flight from the Shroud, then? But, no, that didn’t make sense either-- Y’shtola had never seen that for herself, nor were Rinh’s descriptions, elliptical and cautious as they were, sufficient to summon up such a vivid mental image.

Something else was going on. Fire raining from the sky, the world she knew coming to an end, a sense of panic, of indecision--

“What sayest thou, Master Matoya?” asked Urianger, who’d apparently noticed how Y’shtola was frozen in place, momentarily at a loss, “We may accept this fate, or defy it, but we cannot deny it.”

“Deny?” Y’shtola answered, firmly rooting herself back in the here and now, “I am not wont to run from my troubles.” 

After only a moment more to consider her options, she elects not to climb back down the tower. It  _ was _ on fire, but it wasn’t like anything on the ground was  _ less _ on fire; at least up here, she had a clear line of sight to Forgiven Vengeance. She reaches out to the aether around her and, with a wave of Nightseeker, tilts its aspect towards ice. This aetherial imbalance quickly cascaded into a fierce blizzard, snow and ice whipping around her.

This served two purposes. The first, of course, was the obvious-- the cold would, with any luck, counteract the heat and the flames. The second, however, was more important. By the principles of thaumaturgy, the umbral charge of the aspect of ice would draw in more aether than it expends. Sin eaters, with their single-minded instinct to gorge on as much aether as possible, would turn their attention to her— and away from the Night’s Blessed below as they frantically tried to put out the fires spreading through their homes.

Forgiven Vengeance turned its baleful gaze upon Y’shtola. Eudoxia’s fine hume features were perfectly preserved on the eater’s petrified face, but its eyes held none of the knight’s sagacity or compassion— they were just two pools of polished, blackened stone set in a statue’s eye sockets. With a sweeping motion of Ragnarok, a tree burst into flames and collapsed in Y’shtola’s general direction. 

But she stood firm, even as the tree missed her by scarcely a yalm or two and the updraft blasted hot air at her, stinging her cheeks, blowing her cloak’s hood out of place. "Until our friend returns,” Y’shtola said, Nightseeker held aloft,  _ “I will hold the line!” _

With a murmured incantation, the aether she’d gathered around her tilted towards the aspect of lighting, and a bolt of crackling electricity lanced directly towards the sin eater, the sharp peal of thunder rising even above the roar of flames. The eater, its carapace fracturing in this onslaught, swooped towards her, blade pointed right at her heart.

_ Oh,  _ thought Y’shtola, and the blade plunged into her chest.

And then— Urianger’s astrolabe spun, a new hand of cards was dealt as the stars subtly realigned themselves, and a kinder fate was woven for the sorceress.

_ Oh,  _ thought Y’shtola, and the blade smashed the watchtower’s guardrail before getting lodged in the sturdier wood of the observation deck.

She knew she only had a moment to act— she could already see the floorboards around Ragnarok starting to smoulder— but a moment was all she needed. She was still surrounded by lightning aether, and it was child’s play to discharge it directly into the blade’s conductive metal.

Forgiven Vengeance exploded— first into chunks of stone and shards of gold, and then a burst of Light, and the lesser eaters following in its wake scattered.

***

The fires had been mostly doused, or at least kept at bay by conjured ice and water. The immediate danger had passed, leaving the stunned Night’s Blessed to take stock of their surroundings.

They found little that was encouraging. Fort Gohn, the home of the Blessed for decades— the only home many of them had ever known— was a smoking ruin, its walls and temples and homes nothing but skeletons of charred wood.

But this was nothing compared to the loss of life they’d suffered. Countless of the Blessed— from hunters and guards marshaled for the fort’s desperate defense to townspeople caught unawares in their homes.

Theowren was dead. So were most of her priestly colleagues, all of their collected wisdom  and power and experience reduced to ash.

“You saved our lives, Master Matoya,” Runar said, “But I fear the Night’s Blessed are finished, now, anyroad. What future can we have, after a thing like that?”

Y’shtola looked around; no one seemed to be taking charge of the situation.

So Y’shtola stepped forward. She might be a more recent arrival, but she, too, called these woods home. “Tomorrow will always come, Runar,” she said, “whether we forsake our ability to shape it or not.  _ Night’s Blessed!” _ she added, raising her voice, “We have suffered a grievous blow this day. But we will not be felled by it. You are resilient— you have not only endured the Flood, but kept the promise of the night close to your hearts, even as the Light shines mercilessly. You will endure this, too. We shall continue on, towards tomorrow, carrying the memory of all who we have consigned to the Sunless Sea with us. From here to there. From now to our future. From this terrible dawn to the coming night.”

One foot in front of the other, Y’shtola thought, unbidden, until she no longer felt the flames at her back.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first real attempt at a multi-chapter fanfic! hopefully you'll like it, though-- and be patient waiting for these extremely emotionally constipated cats to realize that they each have at least one (1) feeling


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